My blurry appearance as an extra in Adventureland.

Vitals

Me, evidently a fan of amusement parks

Pittsburgh, Summer 1987

Film: Adventureland
Release Date: April 3, 2009
Director: Greg Mottola
Costume Designer: Melissa Toth

Background

As today is my 32nd birthday (a day I share with Ernest Hemingway, Robin Williams, and Cat Stevens, to name a few) I’m going to exercise my blogger’s right to shift direction a bit and focus on… me!

In case my blog about style in the movies didn’t give it away, I’ve always been a fan of movies. While I never harbored dreams of stardom, there had always been a part of me that got a kick out of seeing myself on screen—which my fiancée attributes to my Leo ascendant—and I spent many a weekend in high school cajoling my patient friends into starring in some amateur production of mine, typically a half-baked story driven by gangsters, guns, and Goodwill-purchased suits.

It wasn’t until I entered college that I considered actually being part of an actual production, tossing my proverbial hat into the ring by registering as an extra with a local casting agency that has worked on several major productions filmed in Pittsburgh including The Dark Knight Rises, Jack Reacher, and The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Just two months into my freshman year at Pitt, the agency announced that extras of all ages would be needed for a day spent filming at Kennywood, the amusement park that had been the setting of many fond memories since early childhood. The park was being transformed back in time two decades for the 1980s-set comedy Adventureland, which would star Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart as college students spending their summer working at an amusement park.

While I never got to meet either of the leads—in fact, I’m not even sure if Kristen Stewart was on set that day as she wasn’t in any of those scenes—Bill Hader, Ryan Reynolds, and Kristin Wiig all contributed to making the day a memorable and engaging experience for us extras, generously taking the time to chat and joke with us. A highlight of the scenes filmed that day was the introduction of Margarita Levieva as Lisa P., an alluring park employee whose idea of operating rides meant merely gyrating to Shannon’s “Let the Music Play”, a 1983 dance-pop hit single that we heard many, many times that day… and which I never need to hear again.

One of my favorite vignettes of the movie finds insecure park employee James (Eisenberg) sharing a joint with Lisa P. inside a dismantled Whip car, a colorful foreground against a smoky evening in the Steel City, scored only by the thrilled screams of Thunderbolt riders.

“Summer in Pittsburgh… that’s fuckin’ harsh,” decries Michael Zegen as one of James’ buddies, and I’ll try not to take offense. Southwestern Pennsylvania had long provided a familiar backdrop for movies like Night of the Living Dead, The Deer Hunter, Flashdance, The Silence of the Lambs, and Striking Distance, the latter perhaps the least known of the bunch (for good reason) but one often proudly touted by Pittsburghers for how prominently the city is featured.

In the 2000s, Pennsylvania began offering tax incentives for productions to be filmed in the state, which saw a boom with movies like The Road, The Next Three Days, She’s Out of My League, The Dark Knight Rises, Southpaw (which was partially filmed at my office!), Fences, and A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, and Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom among the many to set up shop in the Pittsburgh area. Adventureland may have been among the first of this new wave of movies not only filmed in Pittsburgh, but often set here as well.

The nostalgic Cancer side of me has always had a soft spot for coming-of-age movies, so I was pleased when I finally got to watch Adventureland in theaters after witnessing how the proverbial sausage was made a year and a half earlier. It’s a fine companion piece to The Perks of Being a Wallflower, which also addresses the awkwardness of young love, heartbreak, and hope while taking advantage of its Pittsburgh setting.

What’d I Wear?

Early on the morning of October 25, 2007, I was dropped off in front of Kennywood, equipped with a bag full of my own clothing that I had hoped would fit the desired description of looking like something straight out of a summer in Reagan-era Pittsburgh. (The creation of BAMF Style was still five years away, but I had been paying attention to period costumes for quite some time already!)

It’s been 84 14 years so my recollection may be a little hazy, but I remember hustling into a pavilion with the other extras—all of whom ranged in age, appearance, and enthusiasm—for costume selection. Some were issued costumes while others, including yours truly, had brought their own clothing to be analyzed and approved. My first outfit to make the cut consisted of a light pink Lacoste polo shirt and white jeans.

Sharing the screen with Jesse Eisenberg, Ryan Reynolds, and Bill Hader (as well as a very kind fellow extra that I was paired up with for the day.)

The Lacoste polo had been pioneered by none other than French tennis champion René Lacoste, who founded his clothing company of the same name in 1933, specializing in his signature polo shirts with a green crocodile embroidered over the left breast in reference to his name. I received my first two Lacoste polos for Christmas in 2004, when I was in the tenth grade. Both were the then-standard 5191L short-sleeved model, size 4, made from cotton piqué. The colors were light blue and light pink, the latter providing just enough that pastel ’80s je nais se quoi that I selected it for my Adventureland kit. (In the nearly two decades since, the 5191L appears to have been superseded by the similar L.12.12.)

The white low-rise jeans were from American Eagle, purchased only a few months earlier during the summer of 2004. I wore them in Adventureland with a thick brown burnished leather belt, likely also from American Eagle. My sandals were the classic stone Birkenstock slides, with two buckle-fastened straps, worn inexplicably (or perhaps as requested?) with white socks.

Strolling through center screen just after Bill Hader’s character storms from his office with a baseball bat. Evidently, my hungry character has picked up a box of popcorn.

During the daytime scenes, I had a pair of gold-framed aviator-style sunglasses clipped to my belt loop, again also likely from American Eagle and a smart choice for me to have chosen—if I may say so myself—as Adventureland was set during the summer of 1987, only a year after Tom Cruise famously wore his Ray-Ban Aviators while quenching his “need for speed” in Top Gun.

The only piece of my proposed costume that hadn’t passed muster was my digital watch, a Timex Ironman on a silver-toned link bracelet. I had yet to really get into watches, instead only needing something that quickly told me the time. Had I selected a Timex T80 I may have been allowed—if not encouraged!—to continue wearing it on screen, but the costume team member working with us extras wisely nixed my anachronistic Ironman… leaving only an embarrassing ring of sun-starved skin around my left wrist that actually makes its way on screen (as seen in the still sourced for the top of this post.)

Even the photo I took of myself from the day was blurry, though I’d blame that on that wicked LG VX8300 and the fact that I don’t believe “behind-the-scenes” photos like this were necessarily… encouraged.

How to Get the Look

While perhaps preppier than anything I’d wear to an amusement park today, I was evidently dressing to impress back in the summer of ’87… but should I have popped the collar?

• Light pink cotton piqué Lacoste short-sleeve polo shirt
• White cotton American Eagle jeans
• Brown burnished leather belt
• Tan Birkenstock sandals
• White socks

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie. Everyone is great in it, but I’m particularly convincing in my role as Guy Walking Through the Park Carrying Snacks.

The post My day as an extra in Adventureland appeared first on BAMF Style.

Toni Servillo as Jep Gambardella in The Great Beauty (La grande bellezza) (2013)

Vitals

Toni Servillo as Jep Gambardella, cultured art critic and one-time novelist

Rome, Summer 2012

Film: The Great Beauty
(Italian title: La grande bellezza)
Release Date: May 21, 2013
Director: Paolo Sorrentino
Costume Designer: Daniela Ciancio
Tailor: Cesare Attolini

Background

Few images illustrate Gershwin’s celebrated concept of “summertime… and the livin’ is easy” as effectively as the hammock. Fittingly, #NationalHammockDay comes at us in midsummer, celebrated annually on July 22.

Paolo Sorrentino’s magnificent masterpiece La grande bellezza stars Toni Servillo as Jep Gambardella, the 65-year-old “king of the high life” whose opulent apartment on Piazza del Colosseo boasts a terrace overlooking the Eternal City. When not hosting his stylish coterie of fellow cultural critics, Jep often takes to the self-suspended hammock positioned on his terrace, drink in hand as he allows his mind to wander while basking under the Roman sun.

What’d He Wear?

In this isolated vignette, we don’t know if Jep had been dressed for the day or if he’s prepared for yet another of his fabulous evening adventures (likely the latter), but he looks characteristically stylish reclined in his hammock, sporting a variation of his “uniform”: clean white shirt and trousers with a colorful linen sports coat.

One of many immaculately tailored for La grande bellezza by Neapolitan tailor Cesare Attolini, Jep’s single-breasted sport jacket is constructed in a cool-wearing powder-blue linen. As with the rest of his wardrobe, the soft-shouldered cut and many of the details are consistent with the Neapolitan tradition that had been revolutionized by Vincenzo Attolini—Cesare’s father—during the 1930s.

The broad, double back-stitched notch lapels roll to the top of the three front buttons, of which Jep is able to keep the center button fastened even when reclined across his hammock. In addition to the flapped hip pockets, the jacket features the celebrated “barchetta” breast pocket—so named for the welt resembling a boat-shaped curve—which Jep dresses with a scarlet, navy, and bronze paisley silk pocket square. The double vents reflect the recent style emerging among Italian tailors, who tended to render their jackets ventless during the Neapolitan heyday of the ’50s and ’60s. Jep’s jacket sleeves are built with the bumped “con rollino” at the shoulder, finished at the cuff with four “kissing” buttons that echo those on the front of the jacket.

Jep wears his usual white underpinnings, consisting of a cotton shirt with a tall collar, plain “French placket”, and button cuffs and his cotton chino cloth flat front trousers. He holds up the trousers with a black leather belt that closes through a well-polished single-toned rectangular single-prong buckle. He holds up the trousers with a leather belt, so dark that it appears black, a surprising contrast against the rest of his outfit. The belt closes through a well-polished silver-toned rectangular single-prong buckle.

In an interview with Michael J. Agovino for Esquire, David di Donatello-winning costume designer Daniela Ciancio confirmed that all of Jep’s shoes were Hogan and Tod’s (both Tod’s Group brands). These split-toe oxfords have black calf uppers, coordinating with the belt but a surprisingly stark contrast for this otherwise light-toned outfit. Jep wears them with light beige socks that add a shade of not-unwelcome warmth between his shoes and his trousers’ plain-hemmed bottoms.

Reclining in the sun, Jep wears a pair of dark brown wire-framed sunglasses with brown tinted lenses and an elegantly thin gold bridge and arms. The retro-cool sensibilities suit Jep’s character while also flattering the shape of his head.

Jep’s watch is almost certainly a Rolex, worn on the Swiss watchmaker’s signature three-piece “Oyster” link bracelet. A reader who emailed Jake’s Rolex World last year proposed that Jep wore a steel Air-King, likely the ref. 14010 with a silver dial that has non-numeric hour markers. However, an Instagram commenter also suggested to me that Jep may more likely be wearing a platinum Rolex Day-Date with an ice-blue dial.

How to Get the Hammock

Given the spirit of the day, I only thought it appropriate to share how to partake like Jep in la dolce vita. Our hero reclines on his terrace on the Unopiù “Amanda”, a self-supporting hammock consisting of an organic white cotton corded two-seat net hooked to opposing sides of a laminated wood arc, itself secured to two perpendicular wooden beams on the ground.

As of July 2021, the Amanda hammock can be ordered from ArchiProducts, which proudly boasts of its connection to La grande bellezza.

How to Get the Look

Toni Servillo as Jep Gambardella in The Great Beauty (La grande bellezza) (2013)

Even in respite, Jep Gambardella can’t help but to be one of the most stylish movie characters in recent history, reclining on his hammock in a pale blue linen sports coat that gently contrasts against his usual white shirt and trousers, the overall outfit accented by his vintage-inspired sunglasses, colorful pocket square, and refreshing drink in hand.

• Powder-blue linen Neapolitan-tailored single-breasted 3-button sport jacket with notch lapels, wide-welted “barchetta” breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 4-button “kissing” cuffs, and double vents
• White cotton shirt with semi-spread collar, plain front, and button cuffs
• White cotton chino flat front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black leather belt with polished silver rectangular single-prong buckle
• Black leather split-toe oxford shoes
• Light beige cotton lisle socks
• Dark brown wire-framed sunglasses with round brown tinted lenses and gold bridge/arms
• Rolex Air-King with stainless steel 34mm case, silver dial with non-numeric markers, and steel Oyster-style link bracelet
• Scarlet, navy, and bronze paisley silk twill pocket square

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

You can also read more about the style of The Great Beauty in Michael J. Agovino’s frequently cited Esquire article here and more about Neapolitan tailoring in Sonya Glyn Nicholson’s piece for Parisian Gentleman here. I also recommend this thoughtful tribute to the film’s style from The Tweed Pig.

The post La grande bellezza (The Great Beauty): Jep’s Hammock-Ready Blue Linen appeared first on BAMF Style.

Mel Gibson and Michelle Pfeiffer in Tequila Sunrise (1988)

Vitals

Mel Gibson as Dale “Mac” McKussic, retired drug dealer

Los Angeles, Summer 1988

Film: Tequila Sunrise
Release Date: December 2, 1988
Director: Robert Towne
Costume Designer: Julie Weiss

Background

Following his success as a screenwriter—credited and uncredited—on some of the most memorable movies of the ’70s, Robert Towne intended for his sophomore directorial film, Tequila Sunrise, to be something of a spiritual follow-up to Chinatown, which… it isn’t.

Don’t get me wrong, I did get some enjoyment out of Tequila Sunrise and there’s no denying that it’s refreshingly original—almost to a questionable degree—but I would argue it’s not even close to the same league as Chinatown, let alone Bonnie & Clyde, The Godfather, The Last Detail, Marathon Man, or the other excellent films that benefited from Towne’s contributions.

Several had recommended Tequila Sunrise to me for its style, and I’ll admit the name intrigued me, so I mentally scheduled to watch it and write about it in time for #NationalTequilaDay, celebrated annually on July 24… so happy National Tequila Day!

Before watching the movie, I did some Googling to see what kind of looks I’d be covering, assuming that today’s post would either be about Mel Gibson’s blue aloha shirt or perhaps one of the sharp suits that Kurt Russell wears as part of his Detective Pat Riley cosplay. Unfortunately, the aloha shirt only shows up for a fleeting scene at a phone booth, and Russell doesn’t tipple any tequila while wearing those natty suits… which leaves us with a pretty slapdash look as Gibson’s character turns to his loyal Herradura.

Gibson doesn’t try to conceal his natural Australian accent while portraying Dale “Mac” McKussic, a surprisingly sensitive cocaine dealer (yes, you read that right) who’s trying to go straight, if tempted by the occasional opportunity to help friends like his thickheaded lawyer out with their fledgling drug deals. He enjoys a convenient childhood association with Nick Frescia (Kurt Russell), the slick-suited and even slicker-haired homicide detective just promoted to lieutenant of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department narcotics division, though their hot-and-cold friendship devolves into romantic rivalry for the affections of the stylish restauranteur Jo Ann Vallenari (Michelle Pfeiffer).

The complications of the messy love triangle result in one afternoon where Jo Ann storms onto a beach to confront Mac, who is watching his son compete in a surfing competition. Just as Jo Ann’s temper flares, Mac’s son gets into an accident and catalyzes Mac’s parental instincts as he rushes into the waves. Back at his condo, he tucks his son into bed and recovers with shots of straight tequila, which steel his nerves enough that he finally asks Jo Ann out.

What’d He Wear?

When Jo Ann finds Mac on the beach, he’s understandably dressed in just a set of polyester swim trunks, loudly patterned with gold aquatic birds overlaid against double sets of red vertical stripes, all against an ivory ground.

After Mac rushes into the water to attend to his son, he pulls on a long-sleeved polo to dry off. The navy cotton shirting looks somewhat faded, the likely result of hard-wearing and multiple washes that has rendered it into the role of beach cover-up. The shirt serves this purpose well as it’s also somewhat oversized, which would be more comfortable when pulling on over wet skin.

By tucking in the front of his shirt, Mac prevents the oversized polo from enveloping his swim trunks and presenting the look of walking around pantless.

The long-sleeved polo has a two-button placket worn open and a ribbed collar that Mac keeps “popped”, though this was likely due to the hasty context that called for him to put on rather than any adherence to any unfortunate fashion trends of the ’80s. Split with a vent on each side of the hem, the shirt also has a breast pocket.

Given the context of the scene, Mac wears neither the black Reebok sneakers nor his gold Rolex Submariner that both feature so prominently elsewhere in Tequila Sunrise.

What to Imbibe

Look no further than the title. If nothing else, Tequila Sunrise certainly lives up to its name, featuring plenty of tequila enjoyed both on its own and as the base spirit in the eponymous cocktail.

But before we get to that point, since today is National Tequila Day in the U.S., let’s take a step back to define tequila. Distilled from blue agave, tequila originated during the 16th century in Mexico, where laws limit its production primarily to the state of Jalisco. Based on its age at bottling, there are three primary varieties: the clear blanco (young), the “rested” reposado (aged between two months and a year), and the golden añejo or extra añejo (aged 1-3 years or longer.)

Enjoyable to shoot and quick to inebriate, tequila has gained a cultural reputation outside its home country as an agent of undress, often shot with a salt and lime chaser to reduce the burn, but higher-quality tequilas than that bottle of Tortilla Gold you shot in college can be a rewarding drink on their own, particularly those distilled with 100% agave. The traditional Mexican preparation for enjoying tequila is poured neat in a snifter, to be savored rather than shot.

A scene-stealing Raul Julia joins Mel Gibson’s character for shots of Herradura, chased with lime slices.

Herradura Añejo stars as the tequila de la hora in Tequila Sunrise, from an extended closeup of the bottle as Mac drowns his sorrows to him muttering to Jo Ann that “I’ll have some Herradura” before pouring himself a series of shots following his son’s surfing accident.

Tequila Herradura was established in 1870 in the Jalisco city of Amatitán by Félix López, with ownership retained by his family until all assets were sold to Brown-Forman in 2007. Since its founding, Herradura only produces 100% agave tequilas, including the budget-friendly el Jimador brand that has been the top-selling tequila in Mexico since shortly after it was launched in 1994.

Given the prominence of its screen appearances—and how significant the spirit would be in a movie actually called Tequila Sunrise—one can only speculate as to the magnitude of the product placement deal that Herradura must have secured to be Mac’s tequila of choice.

Tequila—Herradura, of course—and orange juice and grenadine are all that Mac needs to fuel a long night of tequila sunrises.

Around the world, tequila has been popularized as the base spirit in a number of cocktails, including the classic Margarita, the Paloma, the Bloody Maria, and the hard-charging Tequila Slammer.

While never actually mentioned by name on screen, the appearance and ingredients used to of Mac’s favorite long drinks—not to mention the title of the movie itself—suggest that he’s a fan of the Tequila Sunrise, a characteristically unmixed concoction of tequila, orange juice, and grenadine syrup, poured into a highball glass in that order to allow the grenadine to sink to the bottom, creating the signature gradient “sunrise” effect.

Unlike some drinks, the circumstances around its development are well-documented. The modern Tequila Sunrise was created by bartenders Bobby Lozoff and Billy Rice at the Trident restaurant in Sausalito, California, resurrecting the name from a combination of tequila, lime juice, crème de cassis, and soda that had been sold by bartender Gene Sulit at the Arizona Biltmore Hotel decades earlier. When Bill Graham hosted a private party at the Trident during the Rolling Stones’ 1972 tour through the United States, Mick Jagger famously enjoyed his first of many Tequila Sunrises, requesting the drink across the country in what would become known as the “cocaine and tequila sunrise tour” according to Keith Richards’ memoir Life.

A year after the Stones partied their way across the country, introducing Lozoff and Rice’s concoction to the masses, the Eagles released their single “Tequila Sunrise”, which peaked at number 64 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1973. Within another year, the recipe officially debuted in the venerated Mr. Boston Official Bartender’s Guide—stipulating two ounces of tequila, four of orange juice, and 3/4 ounces of grenadine—and the Tequila Sunrise was here to stay.

Pat Riley Nick Fresia joins Mac at Vallenari’s, where the retired dealer enjoys the first of many on-screen Tequila Sunrise cocktails.

In her celestially informed cocktail guide The Mixology of Astrology, Aliza Kelly Faragher includes a recipe for the Tequila Sunrise among her drinks ideal for those born under the sign of Leo, explaining that “each day marks a new opportunity for Leo to shine brightly, making the Tequila Sunrise a perfect cocktail for these vivacious fire signs… daylight lovers who receive their vibrant, glowing energy from the sun.” Indeed, it was a Leo—Mick Jagger, who celebrates his 78th birthday in two days on July 26—that loved the Tequila Sunrise so much that he introduced it across the U.S. and deserves some credit for its initial success. (As “Leo season” typically falls between July 23 and August 22, it’s also fitting that National Tequila Day falls annually on July 24!)

For what it’s worth… my favorite summer drink is a double shot of silver tequila on the rocks—my go-to is Hornitos Plata, which I consider the Dewar’s of tequilas, if that makes sense—with a lime wedge, for good measure.

Mel Gibson as Dale “Mac” McKussic in Tequila Sunrise (1988)

How to Get the Look

Perhaps not as elegant as the shirts and swim trunks seen in productions like Thunderball or The Little Drummer Girl, there’s a serviceable simplicity to Mel Gibson’s oversized long-sleeve polo worn over swim trunks in Tequila Sunrise… if nothing else, the approach would be less fussy to change out of after a day and night spent drinking Herradura.

• Navy washed cotton long-sleeved polo shirt with 2-button placket and breast pocket
• Ivory polyester short-inseam swim trunks with a gold avian print overlaying double sets of red vertical stripes

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The post Tequila Sunrise: Mel Gibson’s Post-Swim Herradura appeared first on BAMF Style.

Marlon Brando as Sky Masterson in Guys and Dolls (1955)

Vitals

Marlon Brando as Sky Masterson, smooth gambler

New York, Spring 1955

Film: Guys and Dolls
Release Date: November 3, 1955
Director: Joseph L. Mankiewicz
Costume Designer: Irene Sharaff

Background

I always found it interesting to watch a method—ahem, that’s Method—actor like Marlon Brando navigating the artificially staged Broadway of Guys and Dolls, the gangland-adjacent musical by Frank Loesser, which had been based on a book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows… which had itself been based on several stories by Damon Runyon.

One of the top-grossing movies of its time, Guys and Dolls has maintained its reputation as one of the great movie musicals of all time, despite the two top-billed of its four leads not being professional singers; of the third and fourth-billed leads, Frank Sinatra need no introduction and Vivian Blaine memorably reprised her role from the original play.

Sinatra reportedly resented the non-singer Brando being cast in the lead role of slick gambler Sky Masterson so much that he refused to engage with Brando during production, referring to him as “Mumbles” and only communicating via intermediaries by the end of filming. (In turn, Mumbles intentionally flubbed repeated takes of a scene where Sinatra had to eat cheesecake, knowing his co-star detested the rich dessert.)

Ol’ Blue Eyes may have had a point about his superior singing voice, not that Brando would disagree, having likened his own singing voice to “the mating call of a yak”, but you’d be hard-pressed to disregard the power of Brando’s presence, then at the height of his early fame fresh off of iconic performances in A Streetcar Named Desire, The Wild One, and On the Waterfront… the latter being yet another role coveted by Sinatra.

Brando also shares a charming chemistry with Jean Simmons as the pretty yet prim Sergeant Sarah Brown of the Save-a-Soul Mission. Like Brando, Simmons wasn’t a professional singer before the production but managed to impress many with her vocals. (Not to be confused with Gene Simmons, who indeed is famously known for being a musician.)

It’s their romantic tension that drives the primary plot, including a delightful jaunt to Havana where the movie reaches—in my opinion—its high point as first-time drunk Sister Sarah instigates a barfight. Of course, there would likely be no romance to begin with if not for the terms of a $1,000 bet made with fellow gambler Nathan Detroit (Sinatra), who desperately needs the stack to pay for a garage to host his high-stakes crap game.

What’d He Wear?

In a sartorially snappy world where every guy is a gambler, there’s little room for the traditional worsted suit, white shirt, and straight dark tie (aside from said guy’s wedding day, of course.) A marvelous Girls Do Film post exploring the costumes of Guys and Dolls sets the scene: “These Guy gangsters wear their success with ease and swagger; compare their attire to the sober and more conventional suits worn by Lieutenant Brannigan (Robert Keith)… It’s a stylistic cliché that has its roots in cinema – the brash mobster uniform was created and reinforced by costume designers in films including The Public Enemy (1931) and Little Caesar (1931) and then picked up by real-timers, who wanted to live up to the legend their on-screen idols had set – dressing the part was just one aspect of this.”

Sky Masterson generally cycles through two different suits in Guys and Dolls, a sharp navy suit for nights spent anywhere between New York City crap games and Havana nightclubs and a lighter stone-gray gabardine suit that he wears by day, always with a fedora to match.

The stone-gray suit has a single-breasted jacket with peak lapels, a configuration that prominently emerged among tonier dressers during the roaring ’20s. Due to the cyclical nature of menswear, peak lapels on a single-breasted jacket would have been less commonly seen by the ’50s; combined with the breadth of these sharp lapels, this detail would have more subtly communicated Sky’s status than some of the bolder prints and colors favored by his brothers-in-craps.

Sky’s jacket has a welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, and four-button cuffs. The wide, padded shoulders reflect the fashions of the era while also building Sky’s silhouette to suggest a power that, combined with understated charm, translates into confidence. Detailed with short double side vents, the full-skirted jacket’s short length (for the decade) is emphasized even more by the single front button, placed relatively low but still nearly aligned with the trouser waistband.

The double reverse-pleated trousers have side pockets, which he often places his hands in by hiking the jacket behind them.

Sky represents a more contemporary style of dress than the more old-school Nathan Detroit, clad in his dark striped suit, detachable collar, and polka-dot bow tie.

Sky appears to have had his pocket square made from the same metallic dark gray silk as his shirt. Though Sky is hardly a traditional dresser, the evolution from classic white pocket squares was already in effect by mid-century and—less than a decade after Guys and Dolls was released—sartorial ostiary Sir Hardy Amies wrote that “the use of colored silk handkerchiefs has increased as colored shirts have become more popular,” even going so far as to dictate that “if [shirts or collars] are colored, the handkerchief should be colored.”

Granted, Sir Hardy doesn’t address the practice of specifically matching one’s non-white shirts to display kerchiefs of the same fabric, but Sky’s appearance is still considerably less gauche than many of his cohorts and a vast improvement over the mated ties-and-pocket square combinations often found among the racks of discount clothiers and drugstores.

The shirt has a razor-sharp point collar, plain “French placket” front, breast pocket, and double (French) cuffs.

Despite (or perhaps in part due to) his natty sense of dress from the Royal Stetson fedora to his matching silk shirt and pocket square, Sky’s charm is initially lost on the repressed Sister Sarah.

Brando in costume as Sky Masterson on the cover of a 1955 issue of Picture Post magazine.

Sky tops his look with a pearl-gray felt Royal Stetson, styled with an appropriately wide, self-edged brim and a dark gray grosgrain ribbon. (The “Royal Stetson” branding can be clearly seen on the inner lining as Sky gestures, hat in hand, inside the Save-Our-Souls Mission precinct.)

Under his buttoned jacket, Sky holds up his trousers with a set of tonally coordinated suspenders (braces), constructed from a light stone fabric with silver-toned hardware. We briefly get glimpses of these braces when Sky unbuttons the jacket of his navy suit during the climactic craps game, but a promotional photo used for the December 3, 1955 cover of the British Picture Post magazine illustrates that he also wore them with his “daytime” gray suit.

The next time Sky wears this light stone-colored suit, he has swapped out his shirt for the darker indigo-blue shirt of the same cut and style, likely the same that he wore with his dark navy suit when escorting Sister Sarah to Havana and participating in the famous crap game. His indigo pocket square reinforces the theory that Sky has his shirts and pocket squares cut from the same cloth.

With both shirts, Sky wears the same ivory silk straight tie with its unique pattern that consists of a field of “falling” mini arrowheads, broken up every few inches by a horizontal helix-like shape before the field repeats again.

Sky wears black shoes and socks, though the matte finish of his lace-ups suggest suede uppers rather than a smooth calf leather.

Like many men of the era, Sky wears a pinky ring, in this case a substantial gold ring with a large smooth oval sapphire blue stone shining from the face.

Do we think Ol’ Blue Eyes also resented Brando wearing a ring that may have distracted from his own famous cerulean peepers?

Sky also dresses his left wrist with a gold watch, a subtle but unique timepiece with a recessed black round dial against the squared gold case, secured on a black leather strap.

Curiously, a few alternating shots swap it out for a more traditional round-cased gold watch with a plain white dial, likely Brando’s own. (Might it be the similar-looking Vacheron Constantin that Zsa Zsa Gabor gifted him the previous summer to celebrate his Oscar win for On the Waterfront? See this watch and others at Revolution.)

How to Get the Look

Marlon Brando and Jean Simmons in Guys and Dolls (1955)

While many of his craps-shooting cronies dress beyond caricature in their boldly colored shirts and socks, oversized suits, and pastel hosiery, Sky bridges the worlds of contemporary ’50s tailoring and old-school gambler flash with his sleek stone-shaded “day” suit, unorthodox colored silk shirt and pocket square, and coordinated fedora.

• Stone-gray gabardine suit:
  • Single-breasted, single-button jacket with wide peak lapels, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, 4-button cuffs, and double side vents
  • Double reverse-pleated trousers with side pockets and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Dark gray silk shirt with point collar, plain front, breast pocket, and double/French cuffs
• Ivory patterned silk straight tie
• Stone fabric suspenders/braces with silver adjusters
• Black suede lace-up shoes
• Black socks
• Pearl-gray felt Royal Stetson fedora with dark gray grosgrain band
• Gold pinky ring with blue oval stone
• Gold square-cased wristwatch with round black recessed dial and black leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

One of these days in your travels, a guy is going to show you a brand new deck of cards on which the seal is not yet broken. Then this guy is going to offer to bet you that he can make the jack of spades jump out of this brand new deck of cards and squirt cider in your ear. But, son, do not accept this bet, because as sure as you stand there, you’re going to wind up with an ear full of cider.

The post Brando’s Gray Gambler Suit in Guys and Dolls appeared first on BAMF Style.

Don Cheadle as Buck Swope in Boogie Nights (1997)

Vitals

Don Cheadle as Buck Swope, porn actor and aspiring electronics store owner

San Fernando Valley, Summer 1977

Film: Boogie Nights
Release Date: October 10, 1997
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Costume Designer: Mark Bridges

Background

In the mood for some midweek summer leisure looks, I was inspired by the parade of ’70s style in Boogie Nights. As with so many period productions set during the disco era, Boogie Nights features plenty of the big collars, flashy jewelry, and polyester we’ve come to associate with that decade, and its focus on the porn industry—despite Jack Horner’s insistence that his “pictures” may be a higher art than the era’s run-of-the-mill smut—takes us through the tackier side of a decade already oft reviled for its sartorial excess.

Among the sprawling ensemble cast, I’ve always enjoyed Don Cheadle’s performance as Buck Swope, the conflicted actor in Horner’s troupe constantly wrangling with his identity. Buck already balances a double life as he earns a living both selling electronics and starring in in “adult entertainment”. His attempts at authentic self-expression are stymied at almost every turn, from the electronics store owner who bemoans “what kind of brother are you, anyway?” to his co-star Becky (Nicole Ari Parker) arguing with him that “the cowboy look ended about six years ago.”

Neither the management nor the customers seem to appreciate the western flair that Buck Swope brings to his job selling stereos.

Of all the troubled inhabitants of Boogie Nights’ world, Buck may be among the purest and most selfless in his intentions, though his selflessness comes at the initial cost of depriving him of the sense of self he so deserves. Yet, for each obstacle he encounters as he grapples with his identity, Buck always manages to find champions like club owner Maurice (Luis Guzmán) and his good-natured co-star and eventual wife Jessie St. Vincent (Melora Walters).

After we first meet Buck enthusiastically (and, to his manager, incongruously) stomping to a country jam during his day job at the stereo store, we catch up with him during a pool party at Jack Horner’s residence to welcome Eddie Adams (Mark Wahlberg), soon to be rechristened Dirk Diggler, to their coital coterie.

What’d He Wear?

Even at leisure, Buck stays true to his Western-influenced sense of style, trying not to be discouraged by what he’s told by Becky or his boss. As the accepting Maurice encourages him, “wear what you dig!”

In Buck’s case, that’s a nearly matching shirt and shorts, both constructed of a rich crimson red polyester with white piping. The Western-style shirt has five snaps up the white-piped front placket, ostensibly fastening at the white-piped point collar with a mother-of-pearl sew-through button, though—in the spirit of the afternoon—Buck wears the shirt completely open, also showing the simple gold rope-chain necklace he wears, likely about 20″ long.

The shirt’s back yoke is a more traditional Western style, white-piped with a neat dropped point in the center. The front has white stylized shoulder yokes, shaped like fleur-de-lis as they extend down from his shoulder seams with rainbow embroidery. Below each yoke is a single set-in curved “smile” pocket, jetted in white with white embroidered arrow points on each end. Gold embroidery detailing spirals out from below each armpit for additional pizzazz. The sleeves end in five-snap “shotgun cuffs”, also piped in white, that extend up each forearm nearly to the elbows.

Buck and Maurice remind us of a very specific slice of history when men attended pool parties in matching sets of unbuttoned shirts and shorts… accented by gold necklaces, of course.

Buck’s thigh-length flat-front shorts are also red with white piping, suggesting a matched set. The fitted waistband is piped in white around the top and bottom, with a short tab suggesting a hidden hook closure. The straight front pockets, also trimmed with white piping, are consistent with Western styling as seen on trouser “frogmouth”-style pockets.

Our glimpse at Buck’s footwear is brief, but he appears to be wearing a pair of contextually appropriate slip-on shoes with light brown soles, likely a pair of tan sandals.

To see more of Buck Swope’s unique sense of style, check out one of Cheadle’s screen-worn jumpsuits currently held by The Golden Closet. You can also read more about Boogie Nights‘ intentional costumes in Philippa Snow’s 2017 feature for Refinery29, which includes insights from costume designer Mark Bridges and notes:

In a Paul Thomas Anderson film, details matter. A tiny, perky, perfect porn star overdoses on coke, and the blood from her nose is a match for her bikini; Don Cheadle’s Buck Swope, in a Western shirt as red as bikini girl’s nosebleed, is told that “the cowboy look went out about six years ago.” …

There is so much red in Boogie Nights, perhaps because it’s a sensual color, or maybe because it feels gynecological. Maybe red was just the shade of the era. “This is a big nostalgia piece,” says Bridges. “So I went for a slick, sexy look that epitomized the late ’70s.” Red is slick like a nosebleed, but it also says “Look at me,” like Scotty. Boogie Nights is all about turning sexual lemons—objectification, loserdom, sex as your only talent—into lemonade. More than just slickness, its style is about selling yourself even when life’s not easy.

Don Cheadle as Buck Swope in Boogie Nights (1997)

How to Get the Look

Wear what you dig! If you like incorporating cowboy garb into your style, Buck’s matching Western shirt and shorts illustrate how you can continue the look for a summer afternoon spent partying by the pool.

• Red polyester long-sleeved Western-style snap-front shirt with white piping, white fleur-de-lis shoulder yokes, two white curved “smile” chest pockets, gold embroidery detail, and five-snap “shotgun cuffs”
• Red polyester flat front shorts with white-piped waistband and white-piped Western pockets
• Gold rope-style 20″ necklace
• Tan sandals

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The post Boogie Nights: Don Cheadle in Red Western-Inspired Leisurewear appeared first on BAMF Style.

Johnny Depp as George Jung in Blow (2001)

Vitals

Johnny Depp as George Jung, burgeoning pot dealer

Manhattan Beach, California, Summer 1968

Film: Blow
Release Date: April 6, 2001
Director: Ted Demme
Costume Designer: Mark Bridges

Background

Blow presents the story of real-life drug smuggler George Jung (1942-2021), presented not unlike Goodfellas: beginning in media res at a crucial turning point in our anti-hero protagonist’s life, reaching back into his childhood, and then following his criminal career over the ’60s, ’70s, and ’80s until it descends into a cocaine-fueled nightmare of betrayals and bad hair, all set to a packed soundtrack of hits and deep cuts from the era.

After meeting the adolescent George, raised by an attentive Ray Liotta and a neglectful Rachel Griffiths, we skip ahead to young adulthood as a twentysomething George and his oversized pal Tuna (Ethan Suplee) as they relocate across the country from Massachusetts to Manhattan Beach:

I moved to California in the summer of 1968 with the Tuna. We had $300 and a black TR3. There sure was nothin’ like this back home. It was paradise… and everyone was getting stoned.

A carefree haze of pot, surfing, and bikini-clad flight attendants like his eventual girlfriend Barbara (Franka Potente), these are depicted as the halcyon years of George’s life, all the while validating every afterschool PSA that positioned marijuana as a gateway drug for the ambitious “Boston George” to grow his illegal enterprise from local to national, particularly after a chance encounter with a pal from back home and a meeting with a well-connected local hairdresser.

What’d He Wear?

The Arrival

George and Tuna look relatively square as they unload the TR3 into their beachside condo, George in his button-down tattersall and Tuna in a massive sweater vest, but at least George has the shaggy, Brian Jones-esque hair to ease his transition to the local scene.

Barbara blows a newly arrived George’s mind.

Patterned in what appears to be a navy and red tattersall check against a white ground, George’s cotton shirt has a contemporary close fit, styled with a button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs. The shirt’s top button is undone, revealing the top of a white cotton crew-neck undershirt. He tucks the shirt into a pair of cream-colored cotton tapered-leg jeans, held up by a brown leather belt with a gold-finished single-prong buckle. We see little of his black loafers and black socks, but they were surely quick to be discarded as they are welcomed into the sandy domain of flip flops and bare feet.

The Boston boys will need some new duds to fit in.

The Meeting

After Tuna gets stiffed on some bad weed, Barbara introduces them to her dealer friend, the flamboyant hairdresser Derek Foreal (Paul “Pee-Wee Herman” Reubens), whose connections promise the possibilities of even greater success.

Still relatively new in town, George dresses for the meeting in another button-down shirt, this one a blue oxford cloth cotton with a flapped breast pocket, front placket, and squared barrel cuffs that all close through the same mother-of-pearl buttons that close the collar. Though this may have been cutting-edge casual back home in Ivy-centric New England, it’s still not hip enough to cut it in the dazed and confused world of late ’60s southern California, and the cautious Derek has reason to ask “are you cops? Because if you are, you have to tell me. If not, it’s entrapment.”

George tasks the Tuna with holding onto their substantial buy. Note that Tuna hasn’t yet gotten the memo to stop wearing crew-neck undershirts under his open-neck shirts.

The Montage

Through the first of Blow‘s many montages, George cycles through a variety of casual short-sleeved high-neck knit shirts in bright shades of green, orange, and yellow, all worn with shorts, denim, and sneakers, illustrating how comfortably he’s adjusted to the life of a popular, pot-dealing beach bum.

In a Fast Company interview following the release of Inherent Vice, another film featuring his costume design, Mark Bridges explained: “I love those kind of funny mock-neck t-shirts, which were, again, popular during a small window of time in the late ‘60s.”

Tuna and George ascend to kings of the beach.

The montage concludes with a somber beach scene at dusk as George and Barbie stroll behind a group of revelers around a campfire, a barge blowing smoke in the distance. It may be later than summer, as both are dressed warmer than usual, suggesting a passage of time. George wears a marled beige cable-knit crew-neck sweater, similar to the Aran jumper that “King of Cool” Steve McQueen himself would have worn earlier that year in the super-stylish caper The Thomas Crown Affair.

The Mastermind

Presumably by the start of the following year, “Boston George” has graduated to a kingpin figure on Manhattan Beach: a go-to guy for anyone who needs good pot. He’s now dressing at his most fashionable to date for the era by the time he returns home to find Tuna and Barbie smoking with their hometown pal Kevin Dulli (Max Perlich), who enlightens them on the major demand back home in New England.

George wears a trippy sage-green cotton  short-sleeved shirt with an all-over paisley print, detailed with another button-down collar as well as a front placket and breast pocket. He wears it untucked with what may be the same cream-colored jeans from his arrival, now accompanied more fashionably by a pair of dark brown suede chukka boots.

George works out a new, much-increased partnership with Derek to finance the appetites of New England’s collegiate stoners.

George has even updated his watch, abandoning the plain silver band as seen during his meeting with Derek as he now wears his steel-cased timepiece on a dark brown leather rally-style “bund” strap.

George listens to Dulli rave about the insatiate drug appetites of the bored students from Hampshire to Mount Holyoke.

The Sunglasses

George arrives at the beach in a pair of black wraparound sunglasses, consistent with a style that was popular around the late ’60s and into the early ’70s. However, the shades are clearly branded with the Oakley logo on the temples, despite the fact that James Jannard wouldn’t launch the Oakley brand until 1975. On top of that, Oakley wouldn’t introduce sunglasses for another decade, and the now-familiar logo wouldn’t be added to the frames until 1994.

No, they’re not cops… nor are they time travelers, despite George’s anachronistic Oakleys.

How to Get the Look

Johnny Depp as George Jung in Blow (2001)

The Bostonian export fresh out of the Marines arrives in southern California clad in the Ivy staples he knows from home, button-down shirts and cream jeans. As he becomes more assimilated into this coterie of pothead beach bums, George sticks to this general approach but with an aesthetic more compatible to his groovy new profession and pals.

• Patterned cotton shirt with close fit and button-down collar
• Cream cotton jeans with belt loops, five-pocket layout, and tapered legs
• Brown leather belt with gold-finished single-prong buckle
• Dark brown suede chukka boots
• Oakley black plastic-framed wraparound sunglassess
• Steel watch with round white dial on brown leather rally-style bund strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie and read the book too!

The Quote

We’re not cops, we’re from Massachusetts.

The post Blow: Manhattan Beach, 1968 appeared first on BAMF Style.

Keith Carradine as “Wild Bill” Hickok on Deadwood

Vitals

Keith Carradine as James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok, legendary gunfighter, gambler, and erstwhile lawman

Deadwood, Summer 1876

Series: Deadwood
Episodes:
– “Deadwood” (Episode 1.01, dir. Walter Hill, aired 3/21/2004)
– “Deep Water” (Episode 1.02, dir. Davis Guggenheim, aired 3/28/2004)
– “Reconnoitering the Rim” (Episode 1.03, dir. Davis Guggenheim, aired 4/4/2004)
– “Here Was a Man” (Episode 1.04, dir. Alan Taylor, aired 4/11/2004)
Creator: David Milch
Costume Designer: Janie Bryant

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Famously killed 145 years ago today holding the “dead man’s hand”, James Butler Hickok was a living Wild West legend by the time his caravan pulled into Deadwood, then a lawless mining camp in the Black Hills of Dakota Territory, during the summer of 1876.

Hickok joins Jesse James, Wyatt Earp, and “Doc” Holliday among the most frequently featured figures of the old west to be depicted on screen, though the closest approximation of the real “Wild Bill” may likely be on the all-too-short-lived HBO series Deadwood, in which he’s presented across the first four episodes affably portrayed by Keith Carradine with equal parts charm and grit, as well as the world-weariness that reportedly plagued the gunfighter by the time he rode into the Black Hills at the relatively young age of 37 during that centennial summer.

With his two loyal traveling companions, the glum Charley Utter (Dayton Callie) and the notoriously profane “Calamity Jane” (Robin Weigert), Hickok makes his entrance into Deadwood to a mixed reception—quiet respect from some, like barkeep Tom Nuttall (Leon Rippy) and former lawman Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant), purely tactical interest from ruthless pimp Al Swearengen (Ian McShane), and blustering exuberance from newspaperman A.W. Merrick (Jeffrey Jones) and the clammy-handed hotel owner E.B. Farnum (William Sanderson), who can barely contain his self-amused chuckle when he offers that Hickok may need to “kill a guest” in order to free up accommodations for the evening.

Farnum: We heard rumors you might be comin’, but you can’t believe every rumor! We heard you might be comin’ from Cheyenne.
Hickok: Here I am.

He finds what would be a fatefully dangerous reception from the shifty scumbag Jack McCall (Garret Dillahunt), a “droop-eyed hooplehead” who claims to be unimpressed and unwisely takes every opportunity to needle and provoke Hickok. While Hickok still proves to be quick with those famous pearl-handled Navy Colts, he doesn’t rise—or, shall I say, stoop—to McCall’s bait, having learned from his own tragic history to exercise caution over combat when he can.

James Butler “Wild Bill” Hickok (1837-1876)

Born on May 27, 1837, James Butler Hickok led an adventurous life from a young age, though tales of his exploits were frequently exaggerated even during his lifetime… and often by Hickok himself. It was likely the summer of 1861 when Hickok killed his first man, David McCanles, a bully and small-time outlaw who had threatened Hickok’s boss. Hickok spent the next four years fighting, scouting, and spying for the Union during the Civil War, growing his reputation after the war ended when he killed another man, Davis Tutt, during one of the few recorded instances of an actual one-on-one, High Noon-style quickdraw duel in the old west. The Tutt gunfight cemented Hickok’s celebrity status after it was described by journalist Colonel George Ward Nichols for Harper’s magazine. Hickok’s fearsome reputation followed him as he drifted from buffalo hunting to occasional stints as a lawman across the plains over the next decade.

However, the tide of Hickok’s life changed after one night in October 1871. While serving as town marshal in the wild cowtown of Abilene, Kansas, Hickok was provoked to draw down on gambler Phil Coe, shooting Coe in the street. In the intensity of the moment, Hickok spied another figure rushing toward him and fired two more rounds from his Navy Colts… only to realize he had just shot and killed his own deputy, Mike Williams, who had been running to assist.

The incident would haunt Hickok and, combined with his decreasing health and eyesight—a result of glaucoma—Wild Bill made an effort to keep his revolvers holstered for the rest of his life, seeking a less violent path for his remaining years.

When the smoke cleared in Abilene, Hickok realized the second man he shot was his own deputy. (From Walter Hill’s 1995 biopic Wild Bill, starring Jeff Bridges as Hickok.)

In addition to portraying himself—poorly, by all accounts—in a traveling show operated by his pal “Buffalo Bill” Cody, Hickok resolved himself to “normal life” by marrying Agnes Thatcher Lake, a circus promoter he had known for years, in the spring of 1876. Only months later, he would join Charley Utter’s wagon train heading to the Black Hills gold crush that would lead him to his fate in Deadwood.

The events of August 2, 1876, have been immortalized as one of the most notorious “back-shootings” ever, as Hickok was dealt his immortalized poker hand of aces of eights… and a .45 round to the back of his head, courtesy of three-time loser Jack McCall.

“‘Bill’ would be easier on my nerves… ‘Mr. Hickok’ has me looking for the warrant in your hand,” Hickok introduces himself to Seth Bullock, characteristic of the affable warmth and quiet poise of Keith Carradine’s portrayal. Carradine had first broached the material a decade earlier with his brief role as Bill Cody in Walter Hill’s experimental 1995 biopic Wild Bill, which starred Jeff Bridges as the eponymous gunfighter.

A heavily made-up “Buffalo Bill” Cody (Keith Carradine) welcomes his pal “Wild Bill” Hickok on stage in Wild Bill (1995).

What’d He Wear?

In real life and most depictions of him, “Wild Bill” Hickok affects a flamboyant sense of dress, consistent with the exaggerated claims of his exploits and his own dramatic appearance standing over six feet tall with long, flowing blonde hair and a mustache to match.

Appropriately, Hickok is depicted on Deadwood as one of the few camp denizens who wears more than just variations of the same outfit on a day-to-day basis… and actually seems to keep his clothes clean, while he’s at it! Despite a few items that remain the same, particularly his black, low-crowned hat, Hickok cycles through three distinct outfits over his four days in camp.

Traveling Clothes

When we first meet Hickok in late July 1876, the famed gunfighter is at rest in one of the wagons on Charley Utter’s train heading for Deadwood. He’s dressed at his most subdued, clad in a plain frock coat semi-buttoned under his gun belt. Nary a fancy waistcoat, cravat, or waist sash to be seen, as Hickok is geared solely for the rigors of traveling through the Black Hills, ready to mount up as needed to get a head-start in whatever direction has the most whiskey.

Hickok wears this straightforward outfit for most of the first day in the first episode, ostensibly changing after he checks into E.B. Farnum’s hotel to freshen up and find a poker game.

The full-skirted frock coat appears to be made from a dark taupe-gray wool. The short, straight-gorge peak lapels end high on the chest to allow for the four-button single-breasted front, of which Hickok wears the lowest two buttons fastened, the bottom one concealed under his gun belt. The coat has a welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, and a long single vent like a more modern hacking jacket that allows for easier riding as Hickok heads into camp.

Though depictions of Hickok have popularized the image of his twin revolvers carried butt-forward in a scarlet sash around his waist, he also carried his pair of Navy Colts more practically in a traditional gun belt. Carradine’s Hickok wears a wide black leather U.S. Army officer’s gun belt, fastened in the front via a brass rectangular buckle plate embossed with a gold-and-silver eagle relief, recalling Hickok’s frequent service as a military scout over the previous decades. He indeed wears a black holster on each side of the belt, carrying those famous Navy Colt revolvers with their ivory grips facing forward.

Wild Bill dressed for hard travel in a wide-brimmed hat and buttoned-up frock coat with little ornamentation and the ability to keep his famous Colts ready to draw as needed.

Stepping out of the wagon, Hickok dons the all-black felt wide-brimmed hat that would remain one of the few constants across all of his costumes. Appropriately, this wide-brimmed hat with its low, round (telescope) crown is also known as a “gambler” style. Hickok’s hat has a black grosgrain band that matches the edges of the brim.

Hickok wears a white cotton ruffled shirt similar to the ones he would also wear after he arrives in camp. The front placket appears to button up all the way, rather than the popular pullover or bib shirts of the era. The ruffle detailing around the neckband extends partially down the placket to center chest, echoed by the ruffles extending from the ends of each single-button barrel cuff. He wears the shirt sans collar and tie, showing the gray cotton henley-style undershirt he wears beneath it.

On a black leather cord around his neck, Hickok wears a studded, edge-stitched black leather arrowhead-shaped pouch with a removable top, almost certainly a pouch for the gunpowder needed to load his percussion revolvers.

Hickok wears brown wool flat front trousers, the bottoms tucked into his boots. We see little more of his trousers due to the full skirt of his frock coat, though he holds them up with a pair of dark brown leather suspenders (braces), which have silver hardware connecting the wide leather suspender straps to the brown double sets of hooks fastening to his trouser waistband.

Wild Bill catches a few winks on the way to Deadwood.

Hickok wears tall russet brown leather riding boots, the shafts covered by a set of well-worn tan leather gaiters with seven straps, each fastened by a flat silver single-prong buckle. These calf-covering garments are meant to protect the wearer (and his clothing) from the elements and the rigors of activities like vigorous horseback riding.

Gambling Clothes

After freshening up at E.B. Farnum’s hotel, Hickok changes into what would be his everyday dress for days and nights in Deadwood, essentially a variation of what he had worn when riding in but with a more presentable velvet-detailed waistcoat, collar and tie, and a capelet that he can fling over his shoulder. He would wear this across each of the first four episodes, changing only for the special circumstances that arise on the last morning of his life.

Shorter than a full cape, Hickok’s capelet is a rectangle of charcoal wool cloth lined on one side in a black, brown, and beige tartan plaid. Though a capelet’s primary function is to cover the wearer’s shoulders, Hickok generally keeps it all tossed behind him, only secured via strap around his neck.

Hickok wears another frock coat, this one constructed from a brown napped flannel wool. The wide, full-bellied peak lapels end above the four-button, single-breasted front which he keeps open at all times. The coat has two-button cuffs and straight flapped hip pockets.

Hickok coordinates the earthier tones of this everyday outfit with his brown neckwear that he wears knotted into a long-ended, floppy bow tie. (There has to be a name for this type of tie, but I can’t find it anywhere!)

Dressed to make an impression, Hickok finds a seat that allows him to keep his back to the wall at Nuttall and Mann’s No. 10 saloon.

In the first episode, Hickok changes into a white cotton shirt with a soft spread collar, pleated front, and traditional barrel cuffs. Beginning with the second episode, he wears a ruffled shirt more similar to the one he had worn with the first outfit, except that this shirt has an attached collar that he wears flipped up like a wing collar and the placket is fully ruffled on each side. The ends of each sleeve gather at the cuff, where they close with a button before ruffling out over each wrist.

Perhaps the most eye-catching garment in all of Wild Bill’s wardrobe, Hickok dresses for days and nights at the gaming tables in a fancy waistcoat (vest), grounded in a tan material as seen facing the slim shawl collar, but patterned across the front with raised swirling patches of closely spaced brown paisley-shaped velvet that provide the appearance almost of animal skin. Below the low, U-shaped opening, the waistcoat closes with six brass crested shank buttons in a double-breasted configuration with two parallel columns of three buttons each above the straight-cut bottom hem. There are two slim-welted pockets flanking the buttons on each side, presumably where Hickok would keep his pocket watch if he wore won… but, alas, he is out of time.

Hickok’s flat front trousers are checked in dark brown, olive, and rust horizontal lines broken up by tan vertical lines, echoing the colors found across the rest of his attire. The trousers rise high to conceal the waistband under the waistcoat, and they’re presumably held up with suspenders (braces) that remain appropriately unseen.

Over his trousers, he again wears his Cavalry-style gun belt rigged with two holsters for his butt-first Navy Colts, finally getting the opportunity to demonstrate his legendary prowess with the weapons at the conclusion of Deadwood’s first episode when he and Bullock confront a shifty highwayman.

For more “cosmopolitan” settings (which gives the frontier mining camp plenty of credit), Hickok wears his trouser legs over the shafts of his boots. In the first episode, these are the same russet leather boots as seen when he first dismounted on his way into Deadwood, sans gaiters, though he appears to have changed into black boots for the remaining episodes.

Death Clothes

In his final episode, “Here Was a Man” (Episode 1.04), Hickok dresses in what would be his arguably most formal attire, presumably to make a gentlemanly impression when paying a visit to the recently widowed Alma Garrett (Molly Parker). However, Hickok is also presented on the series as something of a mythic figure, perhaps aware that death is coming for him and—consciously or not—dressing in his finest as though preparing for his own funeral.

Hickok anchors this most formal outfit with a dark brown frock coat with a luxuriously napped finish. The peak lapels are semi-faced in a black satin silk that wrap around from inside the revers, leaving the outer portion of the lapel and the collar faced in the body fabric; this detail was characteristic of this era as seen, for example, on late 19th century presidential portraits (e.g., William McKinley, who was seemingly photographed exclusively in these types of frock coats.)

The long double-breasted coat has six dark brown sew-through buttons, arranged in two columns of three. Roped at the shoulders, the sleeves are set apart with seams around the cuffs, where they are finished with two ornamental buttons echoing those on the front.

The pragmatic Wild Bill negotiates with Al Swearengen while trading shots of whiskey.

Hickok wears a pale ecru cotton ruffled shirt similar to his previous shirt, right down to the ruffled placket and the ruffles extending beyond the banded cuffs. He wears the soft collar turned up like a wing collar, presenting a black silk bow tie.

The more subdued breadth of Hickok’s black silk bow tie—still substantial in size by any modern barometer—shows more of the shirt’s details, including the large white buttons on the ruffled placket.

Hickok layers his frock coat over a double-breasted waistcoat and trousers, both constructed from a matching olive-and-black houndstooth woolen flannel. The vest has a V-shaped opening that fastens higher than the fancy waistcoat worn on previous days, the six silver shank buttons considerably more spread out in a triple-row keystone arrangement that follows the slant of the left side’s edge. There are four set-in pockets—two on each side—each positioned so far back from the center that they’re nearly under Hickok’s armpits. The back of the waistcoat is lined in dark brown with a pattern of low-contrast gold leaves.

The matching flat front trousers are held up with dark brown leather suspenders that—due to the trousers’ high rise—remain unseen under the waistcoat until Hickok is doubled over following the “dead man’s hand” incident.

It isn’t until this outfit that we see Hickok tie on the crimson red sash that he was documented to frequently wear in real life in lieu of a holster, tying the strip taut around his waist so that it could hold both of his heavy Navy Colts, each weighing more than two-and-a-half-pounds each.

With his usual seat occupied at the No. 10 saloon, Hickok uncharacteristically takes a seat with his back to the door… unfortunately on the very day that Jack McCall has chosen to sneak up behind him with a loaded .45.

The dust of Deadwood’s unfinished thoroughfare render Hickok’s black leather boots considerably dirty.

Calamity Jane and Seth Bullock mourn the loss of a legend. Both react characteristically: Jane immediately reaches for the first bottle in sight, while Bullock seethes in stoic silence.

The Guns

Given that I’ve already mentioned them at least a half-dozen times, you’re likely well aware of the fact that “Wild Bill” Hickok famously carried a pair of Colt Model 1851 Navy revolvers.

In the decades before the advent of metallic cartridges, percussion revolvers loaded via the extensive cap-and-ball process were the handguns of choice across the old West. Samuel Colt had revolutionized production revolvers with the development of the “Paterson Colt” in the 1830s and, following continued innovations, his Hartford, Connecticut plant introduced the .36-caliber “Colt Revolving Belt Pistol of Naval Caliber” in late 1850.

Per its designation, this revolver could thus be more easily carried in a belt, though its two-pounds, ten-ounce weight would make it a brick compared to most modern handguns. Despite this, it was still around half the weight of Colt’s earlier .44-caliber Model 1848 “Dragoon”. This relative ease of carry made the Model ’51 popular not only among troops in land and at sea—the “Naval” designation referred only to its lighter caliber, not its users—as well as lawmen, soldiers, and gunslingers including John “Doc” Holliday, Ned Kelly, and “Wild Bill” Hickok.

After showing off his skill with smoothly drawing both butt-first Navy Colts to put a bullet through the eye of highwayman Ned Mason (Jamie McShane), Hickok only needs one the next day to dispatch Ned’s inebriated brother Tom (Nick Offerman), as seen in “Deep Water” (Episode 1.02).

You can read a more in-depth report of “Wild Bill” Hickok’s prolific history with firearms in Joseph G. Rosa’s feature for HistoryNet, which agrees that “the Colt Navy was Hickok’s favorite revolver.” Indeed, his history with Colt’s Model 1851 would date back to at least his Civil War service for the Union Army, when he was photographed already carrying his butt-forward Navy Colt. Just three months after the war ended, it was almost certainly a .36-caliber Navy Colt that Hickok used to fire the deadly shot that killed Davis Tutt in the Springfield, Missouri town square on July 21, 1865.

Four years later, his reputation grown (and not yet marred after the Abilene shooting), Wild Bill was presented with a set of nickel-plated Colt 1851 Navy revolvers, detailed with ivory grips and inscribed “J.B. HICKOCK—1869″[sic] on the back-strap. His distinctive Cavalry-style method of carrying both revolvers butt-forward—whether in a gun belt or in a waist sash—allowed him to quickly brandish both via a quickdraw or reverse, which Rosa describes as “[grasping] the revolver by the butt, slipping the thumb over the hammer spur and index finger into the trigger guard. As the gun clears the holster, it can be cocked, aimed and fired in one movement.”

The fast movement of Hickok’s quickdraw rightfully sends his fellow poker players like the cowardly Jack McCall seeking cover, but—in this case—he was merely presenting the weapon to up his bet in a high-stakes poker game. Luckily for him, Hickok’s club flush beats McCall’s nine-high straight and the legendary gunfighter retains his trademark Colts.

At the time of his death in Deadwood, it’s been reportedly that Hickok was armed not with his two Navy Colts but instead the more compact Smith & Wesson Model No. 2 Army revolver. After all, it was now 1876, a quarter of a century since the introduction of the now-increasingly obsolete Model 1851 Navy, and weapons like the .45-caliber Colt “Peacemaker” Single Action Army had made metallic cartridges ubiquitous. Rosa reports that Hickok had indeed updated his Navy Colts to a pair converted to fire metallic cartridges, but these revolvers—once praised for their relatively light weight—were already behemoths compared to the influx of smaller weapons like the Model No. 2 Army which weighed less than half the size of one of Hickok’s Navy Colts. With its six rounds of .32-caliber rimfire metallic cartridges, the Smith & Wesson Model No. 2 Army would have been a fine last-ditch weapon should a friendly poker game turn unfriendly, especially in the hands of a practiced shootist like Hickok… as long as he could see who he needed to shoot. (Hickok’s blued Smith & Wesson, serial number 29963, was included in a Bonhams auction in 2013.)

In presenting the legend of Hickok on Deadwood, Wild Bill arms himself with his two butt-first Navy Colts right up to the end, when he sticks them in his scarlet sash before the fateful “dead man’s hand” poker game in the afternoon of August 2, 1876. Though I don’t believe historical record includes any incidents of significant gunplay during Hickok’s final days in Deadwood, the series presents several opportunities for Wild Bill to show the audience—and the townspeople—his skill, only adding to his feared reputation when he and Seth Bullock shoot and kill a road agent they rightly suspected in massacring a family outside of town.

The following evening, the killer’s brother—fueled by liquor and “branded snatch”—is goaded by Swearengen to exact revenge on Wild Bill, but Hickok—his back to the wall and his eyes alert, or as alert as they could be for someone whose vision was gradually deteriorating due to glaucoma—is naturally faster on the draw than the whiskey-soaked slob. He racks up his body count to two in less than two days, but time’s running out for Wild Bill.

What to Imbibe

Whiskey drives Wild Bill’s urge to ride along ahead of Calamity Jane into camp; luckily for him, Deadwood may have more whiskey than gold. Particularly in the third and fourth episodes, Hickok throws back shots poured from a bottle of Old Weller Antique Original 107 Proof bourbon, one of the most frequently seen labels on the series.

Hickok keeps a bottle of Old Weller 107-proof whiskey within reach as he plays poker.

Though the label on the Old Weller bottles look vintage to the 1870s, I haven’t found any documentation of this real-life brand dating back any earlier than the 1970s. Later episodes would also retcon several modern bourbon brands, with Basil Hayden’s mentioned by name and Bulleit seen on screen, despite neither brand existing before the 1990s. It would be an interesting use of product placement to feature these brands more than a century before their development, which may indeed be the case with Weller.

W.L. Weller had indeed started selling and distilling his own whiskey by the mid-19th century, giving the presence of Weller-labeled bottles in the 1870s a little more validity, though I don’t believe the label as presented on Deadwood had existed until considerably after the establishment of the Stitzel-Weller Distillery in 1935. The brand is now owned by Buffalo Trace, which describes Weller’s distinctive taste as a result of “using wheat instead of rye in the mash for a softer, smoother taste.”

Interestingly, Pete Dexter’s 1986 novel Deadwood, which also fictionalized the early figures in camp around the time of Wild Bill’s death, featured Hickok and many others drinking copious amounts of Pink Gin, the simple concoction of Plymouth gin and Angostura bitters.

How to Get the Look

Keith Carradine as “Wild Bill” Hickok on Deadwood

“Wild Bill” Hickok was one of the most flamboyant dressers of the old West, from his buckskins while in the country to his eye-catching city clothes that often included fancy waistcoats, floppy cravats, and his famous pair of Colt 1851 Navy revolvers with the butts facing forward. While his distinctive look may not translate to anything practical nearly 150 years later, this could be a helpful guide for cosplay, Halloween, Western re-enactors, or just incorporating a touch of frontier spirit into your everyday dress.

• Brown flannel single-breasted 4-button frock coat with wide, full-bellied peak lapels, straight flapped hip pockets, and 2-button cuffs
• Charcoal wool capelet with black, brown, and beige tartan plaid lining
• Brown paisley velvet-on-tan fancy double-breasted waistcoat with narrow shawl collar, 6×3 brass shank buttons, two pockets, and straight waist hem
• White cotton shirt with soft “wing collar”, ruffled placket, and banded cuffs
• Brown floppy bow tie
• Brown multi-checked flannel flat front trousers
• Dark brown leather suspenders/braces
• Black leather riding boots
• Black felt wide-brimmed gambler’s hat with low telescope crown, black grosgrain band, and wide grosgrain-edged brim
• Black leather army officer’s gun belt with brass eagle-relief rectangular belt buckle plate and double holsters (for Colt 1851 Navy revolvers)
• Studded black leather gunpowder pouch, worn on a black leather neck-cord

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Watch this brilliant series, currently streaming on HBO Max and available on Blu-ray and DVD.

To learn more about the real Hickok, I highly recommend reading Tom Clavin’s recent biography Wild Bill: The True Story of the American Frontier’s First Gunfighter, published in 2019. An excellent Western historian, Clavin has also published excellent volumes detailing the histories of Dodge City and Tombstone.

Also, I’d be remiss not to mention Andy Thomas’ “Wild Bill’s Last Deal”, an evocative piece of Western art that I just ordered a print of for my home office.

The Quote

Can you let me go to hell the way I want to?

The post Deadwood: Keith Carradine as “Wild Bill” Hickok appeared first on BAMF Style.

Alain Delon as Jean-Paul in La Piscine (1969)

Vitals

Alain Delon as Jean-Paul Leroy, moody ad agency writer on vacation

French Riviera, Summer 1968

Film: The Swimming Pool
(French title: La Piscine)
Release Date: January 3, 1969
Director: Jacques Deray
Costume Designer: André Courrèges

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

More than a half-century after its release, La Piscine remains hailed as one of the most stylish movies, not just for French designer André Courrèges’s costumes but also its sun-drenched Côte d’Azur setting, Michel Legrand’s jazzy score, and the smoldering expressions of its quartet of stars. “The less you put in words, the more you will oblige me to have imagination,” director Jacques Deray reportedly screenwriter instructed Jean-Claude Carrière.

Deray’s “imagination” draws the most from the dangerously intense sexual tension among its leads, beginning with Alain Delon and Romy Schneider as the vacationing couple spending their summer in an opulent villa secluded in the French Riviera. For his first of nine collaborations with Deray, Delon had personally insisted on Schneider to play his leading co-star, and the two ex-lovers were reunited on the screen for the first time in a decade as Schneider returned to acting for the successful second phase of her prolific career.

Marianne keeps an eye on Jean-Paul as he absently smokes his Fontenoy cigarette.

“Glamour is really essential to understanding the appeal of this film,” explained Nick Rees-Roberts in the recent Criterion Collection documentary, Undressing a Legacy. “Use of design in the film is purposeful, it’s intentional,” explaining the contributions of the setting, score, costumes, and more all worked together to develop the famous evocative mise-en-scène. Recalling David Hockney’s stylized paintings of the ’60s, the swimming pool indeed hosts much of the tension and action driving our characters, almost a secondary character whose reputation shifts from “the best thing about this place” according to Delon’s character to something that must be drained by the end.

Indeed, La Piscine begins in the villa’s eponymous pool, where Jean-Paul (Delon) drowsily lounges in idle and idyllic bliss. He’s only momentarily disrupted by the splash his playful paramour Marianne (Schneider) makes as she leaps into the pool before emerging in a dripping black bikini, allowing both Delon and the audience time to take in her elegant form before she stands over Jean-Paul and tempts him into a poolside tryst. This opening sequence sets the tone for the gaze-driven, slow-burning eroticism that propels La Piscine‘s quiet chaos.

This production photo of Romy Schneider and Alain Delon depicts Marianne standing over Jean-Paul’s head just before the poolside seduction shown in extreme close-up in the final film.

Their rapture is interrupted—in more ways than one—by Harry Lannier (Maurice Ronet), another of Marianne’s former lovers whom she invites to the villa, much to Jean-Paul’s chagrin. Both Jean-Paul and Marianne are surprised by the appearance of Harry’s 18-year-old daughter Pénélope (Jane Birkin), a quiet beauty whom Marianne watches with some amusement as Jean-Paul can’t help but to turn his hungry gaze to her.

To read more about La Piscine, I recommend Robert Abele’s May 2021 review for the Los Angeles Times, which describes the continued action as:

What transpires over the next few charged days of al fresco mornings, frisky afternoons and alcohol-laced nights—including an impromptu party Harry throws for his daughter’s birthday with a caravan’s worth of young guests—is a vibrating psychodrama about possessiveness and insecurity. You can practically hear the ticking toward whatever violent reckoning has been set in motion by this quartet’s baggage and maneuverings. The pool at this picturesque Riviera getaway is where these passions come to mix and clash. Certain longings emerge, and others find a watery demise.

What’d He Wear?

Of course, Alain Delon looks great in his clothing (how couldn’t he?), though La Piscine almost intentionally deconstructs the fashionable figure he cut a decade earlier as Tom Ripley in Plein soleil, dressing him in staples that could be found in any man’s wardrobe: a few button-up shirts, some dirty jeans, and jackets and sweaters to layer on for the evening chill.

“What’s particularly apparent about La Piscine is the display of Delon’s body: the bathing suits, the casual jeans,” said Rees-Roberts. “This isn’t really seen as a fashion films for the costumes they used for Delon, it’s more seen as a fashion film for the fashion industry’s reworking of the film in the context of contemporary fashion advertising.” (For proof, look no further than the 2009 ads Dior ran for its Eau Sauvage cologne, which re-cut the opening sequence of a bronzed Delon by the pool.)

Meet Jean-Paul.

Brown Patterned Trunks

The opening shot may be one of the most famous vignettes from La Piscine as Jean-Paul lounges by the pool clad only in sunglasses and his brown paisley swim trunks. He raises a green glass to his lips, draining the last of his orange juice, and leans back against the stone, only for Marianne’s splash to arouse him from his bliss. (It wouldn’t be his first arousal in the scene.)

Apropos trending European fashions of the era, these tight nylon trunks have a short inseam with no visible straps, drawstrings, belt loops, or anything else that would adjust the fit; the only added detail is a patch pocket over the back right. The all-over pattern consists of brown jagged leaf-like shapes of varying sizes, each containing a darker brown paisley shape and printed against an ivory ground.

Within a decade of the Vuarnet eyewear brand launching as a collaboration between French opticians Roger Pouilloux and Joseph Hatchiguian and Olympic gold medal skier Jean Vuarnet, Delon elevated the brand’s reputation to new heights when he wore his personal pair of black nylon-framed Vuarnet 06 sunglasses in La Piscine. Now designated the Legend 06 by Vuarnet, the frames will be associated with an another screen icon with Daniel Craig wearing them in his final James Bond movie, No Time to Die.

Jean-Paul shuts the world out from behind his Vuarnets.

After emerging from the pool, Jean-Paul wraps his green terry towel around his waist and slips into his black espadrilles. These casual slip-on shoes are perfect for lazy days poolside, constructed of soft black leather uppers and the traditional jute outsoles. For more easily sliding in and out of his espadrilles, Jean-Paul frequently ignores the soft back heels, flattening them against the soles for a backless sandal-like effect.

Jean-Paul and Marianne welcome their guests, though Jean-Paul doesn’t bother to dress in any more than his towel and espadrilles over his swim trunks.

Delon’s Jean-Paul wears the same clothing throughout the sequence, but it’s Marianne who significantly changes clothing not once but twice. At the start, she’s a vixen in her stylish black bikini, the top held on only by two thin straps that Jean-Paul easily unworks during their poolside assignation. She hastily wraps a towel around herself to answer the phone, and—upon learning of Harry’s imminent arrival—changes into a more modest (but still fashionable) white one-piece bathing suit.

As coded in Psycho nearly a decade earlier, women in black undergarments are represented to have more “sinful” thoughts on their mind while white signifies “purer” motives. By the time Harry and Pénélope actually arrive, Marianne has layered in even more pale colors, donning an over-shirt that hides even more of her body from her visiting ex-lover. She may play with Harry’s affections and Jean-Paul’s jealousy throughout La Piscine, but Marianne’s “purity”-coded clothing can’t hide her true intentions of remaining faithful to Jean-Paul.

Bright Floral Trunks

For all subsequent forays into the pool, Jean-Paul wears a pair of bright orange-and-yellow swim shorts, patterned in a groovy large-scaled floral print of white and hot pink flowers with sage-green leaves. Like the earlier trunks, these are tight with a fitted waistband, short inseam, and only a patch pocket over the back right.

Jean-Paul groggily approaches the pool, dressed in a black buttoned-up shirt that marks one of the few instances he wears a shirt with his swim trunks.

The shorts are first seen as Jean-Paul approaches the pool one morning before breakfast, pulling off his semi-buttoned tight black short-sleeved shirt and sliding out of his black espadrilles before flopping in. Harry is strangely proud to catch Jean-Paul ogling Pénélope, and the two sit down for coffee… which Harry then excitedly takes to use to wake up a nude-sleeping Marianne.

Also of note: Harry’s blue static-printed kimono.

Later, Jean-Paul walks in on Pénélope idling in the corner of the living room as Harry plays one of his new recording artists’ albums for Marianne. Lounging in her black bikini, she initially seems receptive to Harry’s flirtatious overtures but then even moreso to Jean-Paul’s return, asking him: “Is it hot out?”

“Scorching,” he responds.

Another day, Jean-Paul and Harry race across the pool, and Marianne determines Harry was the winner as “he touched it first.” Is she signifying that Harry remains the ultimate winner of her affection as he “touched” her before Jean-Paul? Seemingly not, as she then rejects Harry’s offer to accompany him to Saint-Tropez, instead remaining poolside in Jean-Paul’s massaging hands.

Similar to the Vuarnets being Delon’s personal eyewear, I believe these floral trunks—and possibly the black shirt—may have also been his own, as he was photographed by Jean-Pierre Bonnotte wearing something very similar while partying at sea with Brigitte Bardot in Saint-Tropez in August 1968, right around the time production would have started on La Piscine on August 19.

The details of the unique print on his trunks suggest that these are either the same pair or duplicates, and we also see more of the short-sleeved shirt with its narrow collar and a chest pocket on the left side with a button-down flap. Seeing the shirt in closer detail also reveals that the long placket extends down below his chest, though it doesn’t button all the way to the bottom and is thus a popover shirt (explaining why Jean-Paul takes it off by pulling it over his head.)

Brigitte Bardot and Alain Delon basking topside off Saint-Tropez in August 1968, photographed by Jean-Pierre Bonnotte.

What to Imbibe

We learn that Jean-Paul doesn’t drink, but he still runs to assist Marianne as she brings out the drinks tray to serve a newly arrived Harry and Pénélope. In addition to the orange juice (which Jean-Paul prefers) and Perrier, the alcoholic options available on the tray include Johnnie Walker Red Label blended Scotch whisky, Martini vermouth, and Ricard pastis, an anise-and-licorice-flavored apertif named after its Marseilles-born distiller Paul Ricard.

Harry opts for the Scotch, while Marianne, Jean-Paul, and Pen all drink orange juice.

After Harry changes out of his clothes to dive into the pool, Jean-Paul takes his seat between Marianne and Pénélope.

Alain Delon as Jean-Paul in La Piscine (1969)

How to Get the Look

La Piscine immortalized the casual elegance of the late ’60s in the Riviera, celebrating bright and boldly patterned swimwear for men to make the most of idle holidays with little else to do but swim and sleep.

• Black short-sleeved popover shirt with breast pocket (with button-down flap)
• Bright, boldly patterned nylon short-inseam swim trunks with fitted waistband and back-right pocket
• Black leather jute-soled espadrilles
• Vuarnet 06 (VL000600017184) sunglasses with black nylon frames and brown Skilynx lenses

Of course, you’ll also want a set of sage-green terry towels to dry off between various romps and naps.

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California-based leisure outfitter Dandy Del Mar—a particular favorite of mine—drew upon these styles when creating some of their signature swimwear, particularly the “Cassis Square Cut Swim Brief”.

Made from a blend of nylon and spandex to deliver the stylishly snug fits of the late ’60s, two pairs specifically reminded me of Delon’s trunks in La Piscine, the brown “Gardenia” print and the orange “Mango Lagoon” print.

The post La Piscine: Alain Delon’s Iconic Swimwear appeared first on BAMF Style.

Robert Mitchum and Keely Smith in Thunder Road (1958)

Vitals

Robert Mitchum as Lucas “Luke” Doolin, moonshine driver and Korean War veteran

Rillow Valley, Tennessee, Fall 1957

Film: Thunder Road
Release Date: May 10, 1958
Director: Arthur Ripley
Wardrobe Credit: Oscar Rodriguez

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Today would have been the birthday of Robert Mitchum, born August 6, 1917 in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Now one of my favorite actors, the first Mitchum movie I had ever seen was Thunder Road, the Southern-set moonshine drama that Mitch developed, produced, and performed on the soundtrack.

My introduction to Mitchum—now one of my favorite actors—was by way of Thunder Road, the Southern-set moonshine drama I had been determined to see after growing up as a fan of The Dukes of Hazzard. Twenty years before the Duke boys painted the General Lee, Mitchum’s Lucas Doolin tore through the mountains of Tennessee in his souped-up Fords, evading syndicate gunmen and revenue agents while romancing a local nightclub singer, Francie (Keely Smith).

At the time, Smith was at the height of her nightclub fame through the act with her then-husband Louis Prima, also lending her voice to a few tunes in Thunder Road. One of these, “The Whipporwhill”, was co-written by Mitchum as was the movie’s theme, “The Ballad of Thunder Road”. After all, the deep-voiced Mitch was a singer in his own right, having recorded a unique calypso album earlier in the year… but we’ll get to that later.

Thunder Road was a passion project for Robert Mitchum, who had developed the story in addition to producing, acting, and contributing on the soundtrack. He had originally intended the role of Lucas’ younger brother to go to Elvis Presley, going so far as to hand-deliver a script to the singer. Unfortunately, Colonel Tom Parker’s characteristically exorbitant demands for his client’s pay forced Mitchum to look elsewhere, eventually tapping the talents of his own son James Mitchum, making his credited screen debut playing his father’s brother. (Two decades later, James Mitchum would return to this type of material in the 1975 B-movie Moonrunners, which—due to its plot, setting, themes, characters, and Waylon Jennings narration—has been cited as a direct precursor to The Dukes of Hazzard.)

What’d He Wear?

I’ve previously documented Lucas Doolin’s hard-wearing road clothes, consisting of a dark windbreaker, striped button-down shirt, and chinos, but we also briefly see Lucas comfortably in repose for an evening with Francie as she urges him not to continue his dangerous work.

Without being intricately aware of what lined the closets of good ol’ boys during the late ’50s, I was always a little surprised to see Luke clad in this unique one-piece pullover shirt similar to those popularly worn by Harry Belafonte, the “King of Calypso” himself. I can only deduce that the costume decision was more linked to Mitchum—then going through his own calypso phase—than anything intentional to reflect Southern sartorial culture at the time.

The shirt has a broad one-piece collar, above a plunging V-neck a little deeper than the traditional “Johnny collar”. The wide sleeves are continuous with the shirt body with no seams (raglan, set-in, or otherwise), hanging almost like baggy trouser legs, ending a few inches above each wrist.

Luke’s light-colored flat front trousers are made from a pin-waled corduroy cotton cloth, styled with side pockets, jetted back pockets, and turn-ups (cuffs), which were a prevailing trend on men’s trousers during the ’50s.

Lucas wears his regular watch on his left wrist, occasionally slipping up under the open cuff of his left sleeve. Though we don’t see it enough to determine if it’s one of the Rolex watches that Mitchum was known to enjoy wearing in real life, we can at least sense that it’s the same watch he wears through the rest of Thunder Road.

Mitchum appears to be wearing the same style of shirt on the cover of the Calypso—Is Like So… album cover, leading me to believe it could be the same shirt. After all, production of Thunder Road began in September 1957, just six months after the album was recorded and certainly enough time to realistically assume Mitchum had cycled the shirt through his laundry to make the transition from album cover to silver screen. If it is the same shirt, the cloth is a light cornflower blue with three narrow white bands around the waist hem and each cuff.

What to Listen to

Calypso music’s rich history dated to 17th century Trinidad, emerging in its modern form two centuries later and often used to communicate news or protest corruption. The genre began reaching mainstream audiences in the 1930s with recordings made by prominent calypso artists like Attila the Hun, Lord Invader, Lord Kitchener, and Roaring Lion, though it wasn’t until two decades later when it would become a global sensation.

Fortunately timed to coincide with the height of interest in tropical culture, tiki drinks, and exotica, Harry Belafonte’s recording of “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)” from his 1956 album Calypso launched the genre’s popularity to unprecedented levels, and the album itself became the first calypso record to sell more than a million copies.

Mitchum encountered true calypso during the production of Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison in Tobago when he met Lord Invader and Mighty Sparrow, and interest grew in the actor recording his own calypso album.

Robert Mitchum’s 1957 album Calypso—is like so…

Released by Capitol Records in March 1957, Calypso—is like so… consists primarily of twelve classic calypso tracks where Mitchum incorporated the traditional intonations and slang, followed by a rockabilly rendition of the roaring ’20s hit “My Honey’s Lovin’ Arms” and “The Ballad of Thunder Road”, adding another layer of overlap between Mitch’s two passion projects of the late ’50s.

“The Calypso—is like so… album cover art would have taken Pacific Theater vets back to the days of being an off-duty serviceman lounging about at a night establishments, with native ladies sauntering up to them to dance and party,” wrote David Gasten for his This Is Vintage Now review. “The cover art glows red like a tropical sunset, and Mitchum is posing with a glass and a bottle of booze, looking as though he is already a bit tipsy. The brunette model posing with him is dark-skinned, but looks as though she could pass for being a dark-skinned American girl moreso than an island girl, continuing the tradition of blending exotic fantasy with the familiarity of home that made Exotica and Tiki Culture the distinct, one-of-a-kind experience that it still is today.”

Of the album itself, Gasten concludes: “Between the entertaining stories in the West Indian accent, the fantastic and memorable hooks, and the jubilant party atmosphere in the music, the album never gets tiring to listen to.”

(The title Calypso Is Like So would also be used for Bruno Collet’s 2003 animated short film which IMDB describes as “Robert Mitchum lives in a deserted movie set.”)

What to Imbibe

A 1950s bottle of Dagger Punch Brand Jamaica rum. Source: Mixology.Recipes.

We don’t see the label of the bottle poured for Luke’s drink he enjoys as he settles in for an evening with Francie, but the cover of Calypso—is like so… prominently depicts Mitchum with a goblet of straight rum, likely poured from that bottle of Dagger Punch Brand Jamaica rum aside him on that rattan table, as he gives the photographer a knowing look.

According to a Worthpoint listing for a set of branded bar glasses:

Dagger Rum was a legendary brand of dark Jamaican rum produced by J. Wray & Nephew for a hundred years and distributed throughout the world until the late 1950s when it was finally dropped. Three Dagger 10-year-old rum, according to noted mixologist Beachbum Berry, had a “sandalwood nose, and an impossibly rich, smooth, layered taste redolent of apple, citrus and charred wood.” He added that “It puts the current dark Jamaican offerings on the market to shame, nothing in the Appleton or Meyers’s portfolio even comes close.” Dagger Rum was used to create some of the finest tiki cocktails of the 30’s through the 50’s. In July 1953, an ad was run in Cosmopolitan Magazine for Dagger aficionados to purchase this set of 8 Dagger Brand “Cloke & Dagger” glasses. Shortly thereafter, the line folded.”

So what is that evocative-sounding cocktail? Drunken Tiki tracked down a recipe for the Cloke & Dagger that the brand itself had advertised after its short-lived importation to the American market in 1953:

A wonderful new summer cooler—you’ll love it! Here’s the secret formula: 1 oz. Dagger Jamaica Rum. Fill with cola. Add a twist of orange peel or 3 dashes of orange bitters, and a sprig of mint, if desired.

Robert Mitchum, wearing his Thunder Road shirt in an unused photo for the Calypso—is like so… cover shoot, circa 1957.

How to Get the Look

Robert Mitchum’s passion projects of the late 1950s overlapped as he brought calypso-informed sartorial sensibilities to a scene in Thunder Road, dressing in the laidback style from the cover of his calypso album which, in turn, featured the rockabilly track he recorded as the film’s theme.

• Cornflower blue pullover “calypso” shirt with wide one-piece collar, deep V-neck, and continuous long sleeves
• Light pinwale corduroy flat front trousers with side pockets, jetted back pockets, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Analog watch with light-colored dial on dark leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

Honey, things aren’t so bad as they actually are.

The post Robert Mitchum’s Calypso Shirt in Thunder Road appeared first on BAMF Style.

Daniel Craig as James Bond in Casino Royale (2006). Photo by Greg Williams.

Vitals

Daniel Craig as James Bond, tough British government agent

Lahore, Pakistan, Summer 2005

Film: Casino Royale
Release Date: November 14, 2006
Director: Martin Campbell
Costume Designer: Lindy Hemming

Background

On the 00-7th of August, with just two months until Daniel Craig’s final Bond movie will [likely] be released, I wanted to reflect on the start of his tenure and also include some insights from my friend Caleb Daniels, who many in the Bond fan-iverse know as the creator of the @CommandoBond Instagram and blog, discussing the then-significant return of 007’s trademark Walther PPK!

Interestingly, both of the last two James Bond actors have been introduced in their first films with pre-credits sequences that included commode-related combat, each fortelling the tone of respective actor’s characterization. In GoldenEye, Pierce Brosnan cheekily grins as he “drops in” to knock out an indisposed Soviet henchman, while Daniel Craig’s hard-hitting Bond knocks down several stalls (literally breaking down barriers, if you will) in a hard-fought hand-to-hand brawl to the death, a potentially polarizing sequence for long-time fans of the franchise.

Dryden: How did he die?
Bond: Your contact? Not well…

As we soon learn, this was Bond’s first of two kills required before he could attain 00 status. He nearly drowns his nemesis in a bathroom sink, only for the man to suddenly scramble for his gun. Spying the movement in his peripheral, Bond picks up his own discarded Walther PPK and fires it directly at the camera to kick off the opening credits scored by Chris Cornell’s “You Know My Name”, simultaneously rebooting the iconic “gunbarrel sequence” that had been a series signature since the first James Bond film, Dr. No.

The original screenplay, set photography, and a deleted scene included on some home video releases now show that the fast-moving black-and-white sequence seen on screen was actually meant to be considerably longer. We begin at a cricket match in Lahore, the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab, where Bond had been stalking crooked MI6 deputy Dryden’s doomed contact Fisher (Doud Shah), ultimately following him through the locker room into the bathroom where Fisher would meet his ultimate demise. In my opinion, these extended scenes were wisely trimmed to focus more on contextualizing the confrontation between Bond and Dryden, punctuating their conversation with the hard-hitting brutality of our new Bond.

What’d He Wear?

Consistent with the concept of Casino Royale rebooting the franchise, the James Bond character regresses from the debonair agent we know to a less sophisticated “blunt instrument”; after all, this is truly the earliest we see of Bond in the rebooted chronology. Granted, his light layers of linen are contextually appropriate for the year-round heat of Pakistan, and he’s certainly better dressed than some, such as the ill-fated Fisher.

Still, the wrinkled linen, the short-sleeved shirt worn tieless, that hefty belt, and the suede boots don’t complete the traditional image we have of James Bond wearing a suit, though this unsophisticated foundation built in the prologue pays off in the epilogue as a more polished 007 steps onto the screen, immaculate in his tailored three-piece Brioni suit, striped shirt, and perfectly knotted tie, assuring both the wounded Mr. White and the wowed audience that the name is, indeed, “Bond… James Bond.”

James Bond begins and ends Casino Royale wearing a navy suit and light blue shirt while holding an enemy at gunpoint, though the differences between each outfit underline the significance of his sartorial journey.

The Fisher fight scenes are presented in a high-contrast black-and-white, though the prominently seen production photography—including the shot featured on the cover of Greg Williams’ illustrated volume Bond on Set—shows us that the linen suiting is navy blue, perhaps chosen to evoke the color of the tropical worsted suit often favored by the literary Bond in Ian Fleming’s novels. After all, Casino Royale was the first Bond movie to feature one of Fleming’s titles in nearly 20 years, and Daniel Craig’s characterization had been heralded as a return to the rougher-edged character of the books.

In their excellent new book, From Tailors With Love: An Evolution of Menswear Through the Bond Films, Peter Brooker and Matt Spaiser contrast how “in the films prior to Casino Royale, Bond is typically comfortable in his suits and takes pride in the clothes he wears,” while “Craig’s less-experienced Bond… draws parallels with Fleming’s Bond here—anti-establishment and at odds with the formalities expected of him.”

Writing about this suit specifically for his comprehensive blog Bond Suits, Spaiser identifies this suit as crafted by an English tailor rather than the Brioni suit that Bond would later wear, a subtle touch of verisimilitude suggesting that Bond wouldn’t yet have the budget to afford a suit from the esteemed Italian fashion house.

The single-breasted jacket’s sporty details like the edge-stitched notch lapels and patch pockets on the hips are consistent with the coarse linen suiting to signal that this casual suit can be more appropriately worn dressed down than a more conservative business suit. The two-button jacket also has a wide-welted breast pocket, soft shoulders, four-button cuffs, and long double vents.

Fisher would need to do a lot more than just sing “Happy Birthday” while washing his hands after this…

Bond’s short-sleeved shirt was likely chosen for practical reasons, allowing Bond to beat the heat, while taking into consideration that he wasn’t yet at the level of sartorial sophistication to care about the impact of sweat on the lining of his suit jacket. Coincidentally (or not), the choice also recalls Ian Fleming’s controversial decision to outfit the literary Bond in “sleeveless”—meaning short-sleeved—shirts under his suits, particularly while serving in the warmth of Jamaica during the events of Doctor No, mirroring the author’s own preferences.

The shirt is constructed from linen or a linen-and-cotton blend, woven fil-à-fil (“end-on-end”) with white and blue warp and weft threads to create a heathered light-blue effect. The shirt has a front placket and a high two-button collar.

Daniel Craig behind the scenes of the cricket match sequence, as originally featured on JustJared.

The trousers have a flat front and appear to be finished on the bottoms with turn-ups (cuffs). There are side pockets with openings placed along the seams but no back pockets.

Consistent with the fashions of the mid-2000s, Bond’s trousers have a fuller fit that also allows linen to better “perform” its function of allowing the air to breeze through the fabric and keep its wearer cool… at least cooler than if the fabric was form-fitting and repressively warm agains the wearer’s skin.

Bond holds up his trousers with a wide dark brown leather belt that has a large gunmetal single-prong buckle. While sartorial purists may have already been reeling in horror at Bond’s attire (a suit with no tie!), surely this unglamorous belt would send them into hysterics. Aside from creating the image of a less-polished Bond, the chunky belt may have served a more practical purpose of holding the agent’s Walther PPK against his waistband, as he doesn’t appear to be wearing a holster… but more on that later!

Though the shades of the leather don’t match—nor would they need to—the belt coordinates with his tobacco brown suede two-eyelet chukka boots, worn with dark socks.

Bond drags Fisher through the bathroom to ensure his inelegant demise… though it may also be the demise of Bond’s boots, as there’s little hope for rescuing suede uppers after dragging them through the leaky water spouted from a broken urinal.

Bond has yet to adopt the luxurious Brioni and Turnbull & Asser wardrobe that would be featured later in Casino Royale, which leaves the question of his watch. Not prominently featured in the scene, it would be reasonable to question if Bond indeed wears one of his signature Omegas, though the nature of the franchise’s product placement agreement would likely preclude Daniel Craig from appearing on screen wearing any timepiece but an Omega.

Based on the glimpse we get on screen and blurred on some behind-the-scenes set photography, it’s safe to deduce that Bond is already wearing the Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean “Big Size” 2900.50.91 chronometer on the sporty black rubber strap, as appropriate for diving as the watch itself in its 45.5mm stainless steel case with the black bezel, black dial, and scratch-resistant, anti-reflective domed sapphire crystal.

Water-resistant down to 600 meters, Bond’s Omega fares better than Fisher after this brief foray into the bathroom sink basin.

To explore how Bond may have been—or should have been—carrying his famous Walther PPK, please enjoy the below insight from Caleb of Commando Bond:

Caleb of @CommandoBond models his own Walther PPK, carried in a shoulder holster as may have been most efficient for Bond during this sequence.

One of the lingering questions for me constantly is how James Bond carries his equipment in the field. During the Madagascar-set free-running sequence, we see 007 carrying at the 4 o’clock inside the waistband (IWB) position with his P99 Gen 1. But is that also how he elects to carry his PPK during the pre-titles?

Personally, I think probably not. The jacket in this scene is double- rather than single-vented, which makes a huge difference in concealability. I make this claim because a double vent leaves itself vulnerable to exposing the firearm while you go through your daily tasks; it would be very awkward for Bond to be explaining that away to somebody during the cricket match seen in the deleted portion of the opening titles.

For example, say Bond was carrying this way in Casino Royale as he scopes out the One&Only Ocean club. Recall that he pretends to lace his shoes as he inspects the camera placement. If he was still wearing his coat (which was double vented, incidentally, making it a perfect candidate for this example!) the fabric would have casually draped around the handgun as he knelt, keeping it mostly concealed. However, upon rising, the vent would likely catch on the beavertail or grip of the PPK which would prevent it from falling back to its original position, leaving the handgun entirely exposed. I have seen this happen many times, and each time I have I wince for the individual who made that choice. As Bond constantly verifies his concealment prior to going out into the world (as he does in the novel Casino Royale) I would argue that this is something he would’ve noticed and have not done.

I would rather argue that he is utilizing a shoulder holster in conjunction with his softer-cut linen jacket. The jacket’s drape would effectively conceal the gun and provide Bond with ample access to it as well.

Read more of Caleb’s insights in Commando Bond’s most recent post, “How to Carry in a Suit (Without Ruining the Lines)”.

Daniel Craig aims Bond’s trademark Walther PPK during a break filming Casino Royale.

The Gun

The Walther PPK returned to the James Bond franchise with little fanfare after it hadn’t been seen in 007’s hands for nearly a decade since Pierce Brosnan swapped it out for a new P99 in Tomorrow Never Dies.

Craig’s Bond only uses the PPK during the opening sequence, as he too would carry the more modern P99 as his standard sidearm after he becomes a full 00 agent through the end of Casino Royale. (Beginning with Quantum of Solace, Craig’s Bond would again carry the PPK through the end of his tenure.)

To delve more deeply into the PPK’s history and relevance, I again share the wisdom of Caleb from Commando Bond:

Undoubtedly one of the most iconic handguns of the 20th Century, the Walther PPK has a unique legacy as both the first true concealed carry pistol and 007’s most constant companion. Its stunning profile catches both the eye and the imagination. From the first scenes of Dr. No, we hear just why Bond ought to carry the Walther. Fleming’s prose, perfectly translated to the screen, captured our imaginations and immediately forged an unbreakable bond between 007 and the PPK. In Casino Royale, we only see the handgun during this brief and violent portion of the pre-titles sequence, and with its final shot in the film, we get the movie’s take on the gunbarrel, and the powerful introduction of Chris Cornell’s “You Know My Name.”

The Walther PPK chambered in 7.65mm is a seven-round capacity, double/single action pistol designed in 1929 by Walther to resolve a glaring hole in the market. At the time of its creation, most defensive handguns were pocket sized, .25 Autos, (like Bond’s original carry, the Beretta 418) or they were full-framed handguns that were less suited for the deep concealment required of an MI6 agent.

In 1929 the first PPKs found their way to market, filling this huge gap. They were intentionally designed to be carried covertly and became the first real concealed carry pistols. The PPK was designed with all the shortcomings of the current product offerings in mind and was a massive commercial success because of it. While striker-fired handguns are some of the safest and most reliable today, used worldwide by LEOs and military forces, they were gaining a very negative reputation at the turn of the century. All of this was in Fritz Walther’s mind as he began designing the PPK. After years of designing and beta-testing, the PPK was released in 1929. It featured an exposed hammer, manual safety (which also functioned as a de-cocking lever), and a loaded chamber indicator. All three of these items were intentionally included to create something entirely new for the market, something fit for a 00.

You can read more about the Walther PPK in Commando Bond’s first blog post, “An Eternal Bond: James Bond & the Walther PPK”.

Bond and Fisher, armed respectively with their PPK and USP Compact, confront each other in the restroom of the Lahore cricket match. Photo sourced from Thunderballs archive at thunderballs.org.

Of note, the Heckler & Koch USP Compact was evidently a favored pistol among Bond’s early enemies in Casino Royale, drawn first by Fisher to clear the bathroom and then by Mollaka the bombmaker in Madagascar.

Bond and Fisher grapple for the weapon, only for it to discharge and destroy a sink next to them before Bond smacks it out of the struggling Fisher’s hands. Fisher makes one final grab for his firearm just in time for Bond to spin around with his PPK and…

You know his name…

Daniel Craig as James Bond in Casino Royale (2006). Photo sourced from Thunderballs archive at thunderballs.org.

How to Get the Look

James Bond’s sense of sartorial sophistication was rebooted with the franchise itself at the start of Casino Royale when we see Daniel Craig dressed for a deadly warm-weather mission in a wrinkled navy linen suit, open-necked short-sleeve shirt sans tie, and suede boots, a decent and contextually appropriate outfit in itself but not close to the tailored perfection we would eventually expect from agent 007.

• Navy linen suit:
  • Single-breasted 2-button jacket with wide-welted breast pocket, patch hip pockets, 4-button cuffs, long double vents
  • Flat front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Light blue linen/cotton short-sleeved shirt with tall 2-button collar and front placket
• Wide dark brown leather belt with large gunmetal single-prong buckle
• Tobacco brown suede 2-eyelet chukka boots
• Dark socks
• Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean “Big Size” 2900.50.91 on a large black rubber strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, and watch the extended version of the opening sequence to see the full context of Bond’s brutal fight against Fisher.

I also invite readers to check out the blogs of fellow Bond community experts, such as Commando Bond (who contributed to this particular post) and the estimable Bond Suits.

The post Casino Royale: Bond’s Navy Linen Pre-Credits Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.

Joaquin Phoenix as Doc Sportello in Inherent Vice (2014)

Vitals

Joaquin Phoenix as Larry “Doc” Sportello, hippie private investigator

Los Angeles County, Fall 1970

Film: Inherent Vice
Release Date: December 12, 2014
Director: Paul Thomas Anderson
Costume Designer: Mark Bridges

Background

One of my favorite “new watches” over the last year was Inherent Vice, adapted from the Thomas Pynchon novel of the same name. Inherent Vice follows “Doc” Sportello, a stoner private eye dwelling in the fictional hippie enclave of Gordita Beach in southern California at the end of the ’60s. Like the best of P.I. pulp fiction, Doc’s case begins with a late visit from a young woman, in this case his ex-girlfriend Shasta Fay Hepworth (Katherine Waterston) seeking his help investigating land developer Mickey Wolfmann. When another client’s request also intersects with Wolfmann, Doc’s “paranoia alert” is triggered as he’s set on a path that intersects him with an aggressive detective, a plum-suited dentist, and a drug counselor who “[tries] to talk kids into sensible drug use.”

With its semi-surreal tone, colorful characters, classic soundtrack, and general haze of pot smoke infusing a plot riffing on Raymond Chandler, Inherent Vice felt like the spiritual prequel to The Big Lebowski that I never knew I needed.

What’d He Wear?

Inherent Vice was the seventh consecutive collaboration between director Paul Thomas Anderson and Academy Award-winning costume designer Mark Bridges, who also received an Oscar nomination for his work dressing the denizens of Gordita Beach. Bridges’ interviews with Fast Company, GQ, T Magazine, and Vanity Fair provided valuable background information while conducting my own private investigation into Doc’s beach hippie garb.

“This was the first time that Paul Thomas Anderson was adapting someone else’s work into a screenplay,” Bridges recalled to Fast Company. “He just looked at me and said, ‘Read the book.’ And so I did and dutifully underlined every description of every character, any grain of information that I could get from Pynchon, and then I decided how to convey these people in that moment of time—Los Angeles, 1970, beach community.”

Pynchon’s world centers around Doc, our hero who—when not pulling from his disguise closet (a detail sadly excised from the final cut)—dresses solely for comfort in a manner that suggests he raided Serpico’s closet, though Bridges has also frequently cited a rock influence on Doc’s clothes. “A lot of the DNA for Doc was Neil Young,” he explained to T Magazine, citing his daily jacket and Native American medallion specifically. “Many times when I needed an idea for Doc, I would look at Neil’s clothes during that era and often find a unique period look that was great then and still looks great today,” he elaborated in MotionPictures.org, which also references the production notes that describe Doc as a “Neil Young iconoclast—scruffy, laidback, a bit frayed and almost accidentally cool.”

Neil Young, clad in beach hat and OG-107 shirt, photographed by Henry Diltz in Malibu, 1975.

Doc anchors his daily look with a worn-in olive drab ripstop field jacket, which appears to be the 4th-pattern jacket from the Tropical Combat Uniform fatigues that the U.S. Army was issuing to troops in Vietnam. Designated MIL-C-43199, these “jungle fatigues” were specifically developed to be light-wearing and quick-drying for the southeast Asia climate and environment… thus also suitable for a southern California beach. (You can read more about the 4th pattern Tropical Combat Jacket at VietnamGear.)

The 3rd pattern “jungle jacket” was introduced in 1966, taking a more minimalist approach that removed many of the flaps and straps of the previous two versions. The cotton cloth was also offered in “Class 2” camouflage for the first time, though Doc obviously wears the “Class 1” version in solid OG-107. This version was followed by the 4th pattern, most notably evolved to now be made from the more durable ripstop cotton, discernible by the grid-like texture as opposed to the smoother poplin finish of previous versions.

Note the tonal graph-like check texture of Doc’s Army jacket, suggesting that he’s wearing the 4th pattern “jungle jacket” or later.

Bridges explained to Fast Company that the Army jacket had actually been Anderson’s idea, “kind of a cool twist on say, Humphrey Bogart’s detective trench coat. It’s sort of the hippie version of the trench coat,” drawing a direct line from Doc up to his noir progenitors like Philip Marlowe.

Developed as a cross between a shirt and a jacket, the jungle jacket wears a little lighter than the traditional Army field jacket. The concealed five-button fly had been standard since the first versions of the jacket, though the third pattern was the first to cover the two buttons closing each flap on the four inverted box-pleated bellows pockets. The two flapped chest pockets slant toward the center, while the two larger pockets on the hips only have slanted flaps. The 4th pattern jacket retains the back yoke added for the 3rd pattern, and the gauntleted sleeves are finished with a pointed extended tab that secures to one of two buttons on the cuff.

Doc first wears the jungle jacket over a navy popover long-sleeved shirt with red and green floral Mexican embroidery around the open V-neck and around the cuffs. The shirt also has a patch pocket over the left side of the chest. (In a deviation from her usual wardrobe inspired by Faye Dunaway in The Thomas Crown Affair, Penny Kimball (Reese Witherspoon) pulls this shirt on to cover up after spending the night with Doc.)

A rough start to Doc’s investigation, but at least he’s fared better than Glen Charlock beside him.

This outfit also debuts what Bridges describes as Doc’s favorite trousers, described to GQ as “very slim pencil corduroy pants… probably from ’66” before the advent of flares and bell-bottoms. Made of golden wide-waled corduroy, these flat front trousers have tall, thin belt loops—worn with no belt—a button-through back left pocket, and plain-hemmed bottoms.

The next time Doc wears the jungle jacket, it’s only briefly seen as the top layer over one of his more conventional outfits. He’s visiting drug counselor Hope Harlingen (Jena Malone) and—in one of my favorite moments from the movie—screams in revulsion at a photo of her baby, who had been feeding on heroin through her breastmilk, before quickly regaining his composure as Hope continues her story.

Doc wears a purple, pink, yellow, and white shadow plaid cotton flannel long-sleeved shirt with a perpendicular-oriented patch pocket over the left breast, single-button cuffs, and six black plastic buttons up the plain “French placket” front. He keeps the cuffs and front totally open, revealing yet another garment influenced by the confluence of military workwear and rock ‘n roll.

“There are pictures of Joe [Cocker] in ’69 or ’70 and he’s screaming away in a tie-dyed henley,” Bridges explained to T Magazine. “We’re so co-opted the henley now, but in those days it was still a long-underwear top. The hippies didn’t have a lot of money, so they’d go to an Army surplus, get a shirt for two bucks, and have their girlfriend tie-dye it for them.”

Doc’s peachy pink ribbed cotton henley is long-sleeved with red-contrasted stitching on the edges and along the top placket with its three tan four-hole buttons. He wears both shirts untucked over his dark blue Levi’s jeans, identifiable by that signature orange tab sewn along the inside of the back-right pocket, which Levi’s reserved for its more fashion-oriented cuts during this era. The screen-worn plaid shirt, jeans, and sandals can all be seen in more detail at The Golden Closet.

Over cups of coffee and photos of babies fed heroin-laced breastmilk, Doc tries to give Hope Harlingen his full attention.

We next find Doc again wearing his jungle jacket, jeans, and sandals but now with a light blue chambray shirt uniquely detailed with colorful embroidery on the collar, placket, and both breast pockets in varying shades of red, pink, salmon, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple… really, if there was any color left out of the embroidery, it should be personally offended.

The heritage of the chambray work shirt typically traces back to the U.S. Navy in the early years of the 20th century, adding yet another layer of military inspiration to Doc’s duds, though the colorful detailing indicates that he naturally has no plans for getting any actual work done while wearing his work shirt.

What might have threatened to be a conventional look of a chambray work shirt with field jacket and jeans gets an unorthodox twist via the colorful embroidery stitched across Doc’s shirt placket, pockets, collar, and cuffs.

Doc sits down for a mid-day meal and tequila with his lawyer, Sauncho Smilax, Esq. (Benicio Del Toro), reverting to more hippie-associated attire of a puckered multi-stripe neckband shirt and his gold wide-waled corduroys.

The collarless shirt is striped in repeating stripes of various widths that vary between at least three shades of green (forest, mint, and olive), as well as mustard and magenta. The shirt has a breast pocket, plain cuffs, and seven black buttons up the plain front, though he leaves the top few undone. He would again wear this shirt and corduroys for the action-packed climax facing down loan shark Adrian Prussia (Peter McRobbie), as well as during the flashback to happier days on the beach with Shasta.

Doc’s striped neckband shirt and striped beach pants may be a chaotic pairing, but he wears the offbeat combination for one of his few blissful moments presented on screen.

Doc next makes the rounds of his investigations wearing a soft coral-colored bouclé shirt, long-sleeved with button cuffs that he keeps undone. He buttons up the shirt only as high as would be covered by the dark navy self-striped five- or six-button waistcoat (vest), arguably one of the most formal garments that Doc wears outside of his disguises and likely orphaned from a worsted wool three-piece suit.

The vest has four welted pockets and an adjustable back strap. His beige jeans have the telltale Levi’s red tab sewn along the inside of the back-right pocket and, aside from the color, are similar to a standard pair of blue jeans with the five-pocket layout.

Doc counters the potential formality of the waistcoat by wearing it with an untucked, casually textured shirt and dirty off-white jeans.

For Doc’s visit to the office of the velvet-suited dentist Dr. Rudy Blatnoyd (Martin Short), he wears another light blue chambray shirt, though this is a more traditional work shirt sans any colorful embroidery. In addition to the large ’70s-style collar, the shirt has two flapped chest pockets with white plastic buttons to match those up the front placket.

In perhaps his most “conventional” approach to wearing his Army jacket, the non-embroidered chambray work shirt and corduroys allow the eccentricity of Dr. Blatnoyd’s plum velvet suit to take sartorial center stage to establish the crooked dentist as even quirkier than our protagonist.

Doc again wears corduroy trousers, though corded in a thinner wale (“needlecord”) in a tanner shade of brown. These casual trousers, structured and styled like jeans, also have more flared bottoms in accordance with the era’s fashions (but in opposition to Doc’s preferred style.)

Joaquin Phoenix and Paul Thomas Anderson on set.

If the jungle jacket was Doc’s hippie-era update of the noir-era trench coat, the wide-brimmed straw hat replaced Philip Marlowe’s fedora. Indeed, the hat, which Bridges described to GQ as his “everyday gumshoe detective fedora”, follows the shape of the old-fashioned hats with its pinched crown, wide brim, and brown puggaree band.

Sunglasses would have been a must in sunny southern California at the dawn of the ’70s, and Doc’s semi-hexagonal, semi-rimmed gold sunglasses pay tribute both to his spiritual genre predecessors as well as the musicians who influenced the rest of his style. “The stop sign vintage glasses …. that’s something we found in the research that was actually provided by props, but I was in on choosing them,” remarked Bridges to Fast Company. “They really were something that some music people from that time had, but they’re also from the ’30s and ’40s… old Hollywood.”

Doc isn’t one to stand on ceremony, but he signals his lack of respect for Adrian Prussia by leaving his tinted specs on during their ill-fated interview.

Doc’s vintage sandals have proven to be one of the most popular items from his wardrobe, with Bridges sharing that he has received many letters asking where he sourced them. (The answer? L.A.-based Palace Costume & Prop Co.)

Drifting away from the huaraches described by Pynchon, Bridges considered Doc’s mindset before choosing these sandals, as he explained to GQ, “basically, you’ve got this guy who lives on the beach and prides himself on his freewheeling existence so he doesn’t like to wear shoes unless he’s in disguise.”

The dark brown leather sandals consist of two wide straps, one over the instep and one just behind the toes, which are connected by another double-studded vertical strap with a brass loop-bit on each end. A heel strap wraps around the back, connecting to each end of the instep strap and closing around the outside through a brass single-prong buckle.

“They’re of a moment in time,” Bridges added to T Magazine. “You know a copy by his shoes. You also know a surf detective by his sandals.”

Reunited nearly a decade after their award-winning turns in Walk the Line, Reese Witherspoon again found herself fending off the persistent affections of Joaquin Phoenix’s character. Penny’s Faye Dunaway-inspired wardrobe illustrated the contrast between her Establishment-connected character and Doc’s be-sandaled beach persona.

In addition to his disguises—which include a copper-colored double-breasted suit, a dark green velvet jacket, and a black sports coat, bolo tie, and gray slacks—Doc cycles through other shirts and outerwear throughout the events of Inherent Vice, including:

• A blue denim long-sleeved snap-up shirt with flapped, snap-down pockets, which he tends to wear when entertaining Shasta’s late night visits, first with his striped beach pants and later with the cream Levi’s jeans

Again channeling Neil Young, this time in a denim snap-front shirt, Doc looks up to see a naked Shasta entering, clad only in a necklace that falls among her décolletage à la Bob Seidemann’s famous portrait of Janis Joplin… yet another rock influence on the style of the Gordita Beach uni-Vice.

• Another denim snap-front shirt, though made from a darker indigo-dyed cloth and worn over a navy turtleneck, worn when discussing the case with Detective “Bigfoot” (Josh Brolin)

Under Bigfoot’s watchful eye, Doc presses more denim into service, this time as a snap-front overshirt.

• A brown, blue, and ecru plaid flannel shirt with faux-wood buttons, also worn with the cream Levi’s jeans during flashbacks to happier times with Shasta that include ouija-boarding and making out in the rain

Production photo of Katherine Waterston and Joaquin Phoenix.

• A purple-and-pink plaid snap-front shirt, also worn with the cream Levi’s jeans during the brief vignette where he calls Crocker Fenway (Martin Donovan) to arrange the return of the drugs Bigfoot stole from the Golden Fang and planted on him

• A chocolate brown corduroy snap-front jacket, black mock-neck, and Native American medallion worn in lieu of the requested jacket and tie when meeting Crocker Fenway at his club

Doc blatantly disregards Fenway’s request that he dress in the requisite jacket and tie to join him at the club, though—if pressed on the issue—Doc could try to make the case that he’s indeed sporting a coat and neckwear.

Some of these lesser-seen outfits may yield future posts that delve into them a little more deeply, as well as some of Doc’s more notable disguises.

What to Imbibe

Doc’s signature brew is Burgermeister, the San Francisco-brewed lager swilled from cans playfully emblazoned “Burgie!” in red letters above the more traditional logo. Before mass distribution, Burgie! was one of two regional beers named Burgermeister, the other being a product of Warsaw Brewing in Illinois.

Doc’s Burgermeister was a product of northern California, specifically the erstwhile San Francisco Brewing Company which had been renamed Burgermeister Brewing in the 1950s as a nod to its most popular offering. The branding was short-lived, as this Burgermeister would pass through Schlitz’s hands through most of the ’60s before it transferred to Falstaff Brewing in 1971, the year after Doc’s depicted enjoying his multitude of Burgies.

Unfortunately, the national expansion of America’s “big three” beers—namely, Budweiser, Coors, and Miller—signaled death to these once-proud regional brews. Falstaff’s San Francisco plant was one of these early casualties, closing operations in 1978 and taking the Burgermeister name with it. (The Falstaff brand was ultimately swept into the domain of Pabst, who ended production of Falstaff in 2005.)

Doc’s attitude doesn’t quite match the jocularity of his Burgie!

Even though Burgies are long gone, you can still strive to drink like Doc by mixing up the Tiki concoction he and his lawyer Sauncho order from a seaside seafood shack.

“You’re gonna wanna get good and fucked up before this meal,” warns the waitress. “I have some recommendations, maybe the tequila zombie?”

“Make it two,” Sauncho confirms, and they soon welcome a pair of amber-tinted long drinks, topped with a fruit sculpture with a lime wedge, a lime wheel, a strawberry, and an orange slice skewered above the rim of each Collins glass, which appears to have mint mixed in with the rest of the drink.

Doc checks out the tequila zombies delivered to their table.

The original Zombie was a seminal cocktail of the postwar Tiki culture craze in the United States, dating back to 1934 when Donn Beach added it to the menu at his Don the Beachcomber restaurant in Hollywood. According to Martin Cate and Rebecca Cate in Smuggler’s Cove, one enduring theory behind the cocktail’s name was “a traveling businessman who asked for help with his hangover and to get him through a tough meeting. Allegedly, the customer later reported back to Donn that he ‘felt like the living dead—it made a zombie out of me!'” Despite Donn implementing a two-per-customer limit (for the imbiber’s own safety), the zombie became a fast favorite for its fruity taste disguising the potency of its base spirits, which include three (3) different rums, mixed with various juices and syrups and—in some particularly potent recipes—added dashes of Pernod.

Given that there’s no prominent recipe for The Belaying Pin’s vaunted tequila zombie, which was likely a Pynchonian invention, the blogger behind Tom Pynchon’s Liquor Cabinet developed their own recipe, modified from one featured two years earlier by QuirkBooks before the release of the movie. I’ll let you read the recipe for yourself, but it blends tequila, rum, apricot brandy, and vodka with two fruit juices for a bewildering mixture that “tastes like very serious party.”

The Gun

Despite his profession, Doc elects not to carry a sidearm, though he does show some proficiency with firearms. After waylaying white supremacist Puck Beaverton (Keith Jardine) with a toilet tank lid, he takes Puck’s Smith & Wesson Model 36 and uses it to defend himself against Adrian Prussia.

Doc’s capable form when wielding Puck’s snub-nosed .38 suggests that, just because he doesn’t carry a gun doesn’t mean he doesn’t know how to use one.

Smith & Wesson launched the Model 36 in 1950, when it was initially named the “Chiefs Special” following a vote at the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) convention upon its introduction. When S&W began numbering its models later in the decade, this J-framed .38 Special revolver was designated the “Model 36”. With its five-shot cylinder, the snub-nosed Model 36 provided users on both sides of the law with even more of a concealment advantage than earlier six-shot “belly guns” like the Colt Detective Special and 2″-barreled variants of the Smith & Wesson Model 10.

How to Get the Look

Joaquin Phoenix and Josh Brolin in Inherent Vice (2014)

Rock ‘n roll sensibilities, military-informed practicality, and laidback beach vibes converge with Doc Sportello’s daily dress, anchored by a worn-in Army jacket, straw hat, and sandals. Of course, dressing exactly like Doc may look more like you’re going for a “stoner Serpico” costume than embracing surfside comfort, so I recommend just following the ethos that Inherent Vice costume designer Mark Bridges mentioned to Elle: “What we’ve lost since the ’70s is the idea of letting it all hang out… embrace anything vaguely bohemian that feels free and easy.”

• Olive green (OG-107) ripstop cotton U.S. Army Tropical Combat Uniform “jungle jacket” with 5-button fly front, slanted flapped bellows chest pockets (with two concealed buttons), flapped bellows hip pockets (with two concealed buttons), and button cuffs
• Blue chambray cotton long-sleeved work shirt with two chest pockets (with button-down flaps)
• Light brown corduroy flat front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, button-through back pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Straw fedora-style beach hat with brown puggaree band
• Gold semi-rimmed semi-hexagonal vintage sunglasses with brown lenses
• Dark brown leather double-vamp strap vintage sandals with buckled heel strap

The above outfit may be the most accessible way to approach Doc’s style though there’s a variety of ways to visually communicate Doc’s offbeat aura, as illustrated here with the bouclé shirt and orphaned waistcoat.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie and read Thomas Pynchon’s novel.

The Quote

Fucking-ing?

The post Inherent Vice: Doc’s Jungle Jacket appeared first on BAMF Style.

Griffin Dunne as Paul Hackett in After Hours (1985)

Vitals

Griffin Dunne as Paul Hackett, mild-mannered data processor

New York City, Spring 1985

Film: After Hours
Release Date: September 13, 1985
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Designer: Rita Ryack

Background

Friday the 13th is traditionally a day for bad luck, so it’s appropriate that Martin Scorsese’s After Hours, centered around one New Yorker’s evening of arguably bad luck, was released on Friday the 13th in September 1985.

A surreal black comedy with elements of neo-noir, After Hours begins just before 5:00 for Paul Hackett, a data processor ostensibly living the yuppie dream with his secure job and Manhattan apartment… but the job sucks, his apartment’s cramped despite no one to share it with, and he has no social life outside of training new employees. In search of any human connectivity into his life, Paul takes his dog-eared copy of Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer to an all-night diner. (Miller’s controversial tome would again appear in Scorsese’s 1991 remake of Cape Fear, yet another less characteristic entry in the director’s canon.)

“Different rules apply when it gets this late, you know what I mean? It’s like… after hours,” advises the cashier (Dick Miller) at another all-night diner.

Paul catches the eye of the mysterious Marcy (Patricia Arquette), who leaves him with her phone number before dashing into the night. Under the pretense of buying a paperweight from Marcy’s sculptor roommate Kiki (Linda Fiorentino), an increasingly lonely Paul calls the number and arranges to visit their studio apartment in SoHo just before midnight. Paul’s only cash, a $20 bill, glides out the window of his taxi as he rides to SoHo… portending a series of escalating events, surreal scenarios, and mysterious women as Paul attempts to make his way back to bed—either a woman’s bed or his own—and survive the chaotic night!

What’d He Wear?

Paul Hackett wears the same suit throughout After Hours, a beige business suit made from a cotton gabardine, a tightly woven fabric prone to wrinkling—even more-so after being repeatedly waterlogged—that only adds to Paul’s distressed look as the night grows more tumultuous.

His beige suit drenched from the rain, Paul finds temporary refuge in the seedy Terminal Bar.

Gabardine suits in shades of light brown were popular alternatives to traditional American business dress by the early 1980s. Even across the pond, vaunted style icon James Bond was tailored in tan gabardine—both wool and cotton—for his travels in four of the five 007 movies produced throughout the decade, stretching across the end of Roger Moore’s tenure into Timothy Dalton’s first of two films.

The beige gabardine suit’s versatility is put to the test by the events of After Hours, as it was the same that Paul had worn to work earlier in the day. He had already been home twice by the time he dressed it back up to make his fateful venture to Marcy and Kiki’s SoHo apartment, but he still sought to wear this light suit well into the night, likely hoping to make a good impression on the woman he had met earlier… naturally unaware that he would spend the next several hours subjecting it to hard rain and layers of plaster.

Paul leaves his Madison Avenue office one evening… only to return in the same suit but a different shirt and tie—oh, and covered in plaster residue—the next morning.

The single-breasted suit jacket is cut and detailed in the prevailing style of American business suits from the mid-20th century onward, with notch lapels ending clear above a two-button front. The shoulders are padded, though not to the extremes of some “power suits” tailored for men and women during the ’80s, and the sleeves are roped at the shoulders and finished at the cuffs with four “kissing” buttons. The back is split with a long single vent, and the jacket also boasts a welted breast pocket and straight flapped hip pockets.

Paul finds a new accomplice in Gail (Catherine O’Hara), though her alliance would be one of his shortest of the evening once she suspects he’s a wanted neighborhood burglar.

Paul’s flat front suit trousers have belt loops as well as an extended tab on the waistband, which likely buttons in place under his belt. The plain-hemmed bottoms have a subtle flare, though not nearly as dramatic as was trendy during the previous decade.

Straight pockets are positioned vertically along each side seam, and there are two back pockets: an open jetted right pocket and a left pocket that closes with a single button through a gently pointed flap.

Rather than a traditional leather or even surcingle belt, Paul wears a khaki woven cotton military-style web belt with a gunmetal box-frame buckle and matching metal tip.

Complete with a Hockney print, Paul’s apartment offers the trappings of yuppie loneliness.

When we meet Paul training Lloyd (Bronson Pinchot) at the office, he’s dressed for work in a cotton twill shirt checked in a navy, magenta, and yellow tattersall against a white ground, detailed with a button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs. His crimson red repp tie has narrow beige “downhill”-directional stripes, each bordered along the top with an even thinner black shadow stripe.

After meeting Marcy and making plans to meet her, he changes into a fresh shirt, constructed of plain white cotton but detailed like his earlier shirt with its button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs. He also pulls on a new tie, a plain red knitted tie with a squared bottom.

Arriving at the apartment, he finds only her roommate Kiki, clad only in her bra and a black leather skirt as she works on a papier-mâché sculpture that Paul would grow all-too-familiar with later in the night.

Splashed by papier-mâché, Paul begins unknotting his tie… sartorially signifying the transition of his evening into chaos.

An artistic error splashes papier-mâché paste onto Paul’s white shirt before Marcy even arrives, so Kiki outfits him in a black striped shirt that, in turn, looks considerably more appropriate for his nocturnal adventures to follow. Patterned with evenly spaced white pinstripes, the black shirt essentially follows the structure of his earlier two shirts with its button-down collar, barrel cuffs, placket, and button-through pocket, all fastened with black plastic buttons.

As the desperate barmaid Julie (Teri Garr) waits at a table behind him, Paul chats with the bartender Tom (John Heard), with whom he already has more in common than either man realizes.

Interestingly, re-donning his tie—and thus reclaiming his connection to his boring, but safe, life—essentially ensures Paul’s return to freedom, as he ties it on to make a good impression on June (Verna Bloom), the eccentric sculptor dwelling in the basement of Club Berlin who ultimately proves to be his unknowing guardian back to safety.

Putting his tie back on leads Paul into the arms of June, his unlikely savior… even despite her own best efforts to entrap him.

Paul wears brown leather derby shoes, a tonally appropriate choice of footwear with his beige suit, against which black shoes would likely too harshly contrast. His dark socks appear to be black and, as we see during the brief vignette with a lonely Paul parked in front of the tube at home, are finished with the characteristic yellow toe threading that remains a signature of the Gold Toe brand.

Paul desperately tracks the passing hours of his unending night on his wristwatch, a G.I.-approved Hamilton Khaki automatic field watch that remains one of the few objects of value he miraculously doesn’t lose by the end of the night. The Khaki was the Hamilton Watch Company’s successful foray into extending the reliable field watches it manufactured for the U.S. military during World War II into the civilian market.

Paul wears a brushed steel Hamilton Khaki with a black dial detailed with luminous hands and hour markers, the latter further detailed with white Arabic numerals at each hour and an inner 24-hour index to ease the user’s ability to denote military time. (You can see the watch, as well as the gabardine suiting of Paul’s left jacket sleeve, in this screenshot.) The watch is secured to Paul’s wrist on a black ribbed nylon strap.

The prominent shots of Paul’s trusty Hamilton Khaki allow us to track the passing hours of his seemingly endless night in dystopian SoHo.

How to Get the Look

Griffin Dunne as Paul Hackett in After Hours (1985)

Paul Hackett may have low expectations when he leaves his home to meet a mysterious woman one night, dressed as he would have been at work twelve hours earlier in his beige gabardine suit with a white shirt and red tie. As he’s thrust into a never-ending nocturnal adventure, he’s re-dressed in the “uniform” of a black open-neck shirt that instantly transforms his suit from banal business attire into a more exciting evening-ready ensemble.

• Beige cotton gabardine business suit:
  • Single-breasted 2-button jacket with notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 4-button “kissing” cuffs, and long single vent
  • Flat front trousers with belt loops, extended waist tab, on-seam side pockets, jetted back-right pocket, button-flapped back-left pocket, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Black white-pinstriped shirt with button-down collar, front placket, button-through breast pocket, and button cuffs
• Khaki cotton web belt with gunmetal box-frame buckle and tip
• Brown leather derby shoes
• Black dress socks
• Hamilton Khaki brushed steel automatic field watch with black dial (with double-hour index) on black ribbed nylon strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie. To follow Paul’s footsteps, read this extensively researched project at NYC in Film.

The Quote

I just wanted to leave my apartment, maybe meet a nice girl… and now I’ve gotta die for it?!

The post After Hours: Paul’s Day-to-Night Beige Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.

Elvis Presley and Ann-Margret in Viva Las Vegas (1964)

Vitals

Elvis Presley as “Lucky” Jackson, mechanic and aspiring race car driver

Las Vegas, Summer 1964

Film: Viva Las Vegas
Release Date: May 20, 1964
Director: George Sidney
Costume Designer: Donfeld (Donald Lee Feld)
Tailor: Sy Devore

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

On the sad anniversary of the King of Rock and Roll’s death, I wanted to celebrate Elvis Presley’s legacy via his style in one of his best-regarded movies, the 1964 musical vehicle Viva Las Vegas.

Set in the bright-lit berg known as America’s Playground, Viva Las Vegas united Elvis with Ann-Margret, a fellow multi-talent with whom the King quickly bonded to form what was first a romance and would evolve into a lifelong friendship. Elvis stars as Lucky Jackson, a gearhead who takes a part-time gig at the Fabulous Flamingo to raise the money he needs for his own race car.

A secondary objective of Lucky’s foray into Sin City is a search for the mysterious redhead who had stopped in his garage that morning, leading he and Count Elmo Mancini (Cesare Danova)—his rival in both racing and romance—from a show at the Sands promoting “The Most Beautiful Girls in the World” through a tour of the Thunderbird, Stardust, Tropicana, and Sahara, before Lucky returns to the Flamingo, where he finally finds the voluptuous redhead, a swimming instructor named Rusty Jackson, and presses the Count’s guitar into service to serenade her with “The Lady Loves Me”.

What’d He Wear?

Ann-Margret and Elvis on location at the Flamingo during production of Viva Las Vegas.

Four years after the Rat Pack and their well-suited mob of eleven attempted the simultaneous heist of millions from five casinos on New Year’s Eve, Elvis Presley came to town also tailored by Sy Devore, the legendary Hollywood cutter whose high-profile clients ranged from Sinatra, Nat King Cole, and John Wayne to JFK and LBJ.

“Elvis Presley shopped at Devore’s off the rack, picking out 20 suits at a time at $350 a pop,” wrote Alison Martino for Los Angeles Magazine in August 2015. “There were sharkskin suits lined in paisley silk, sports coats, pastel sweaters, skinny ties, dress shirts, and trousers with big belt loops, all finished with an impeccable fit.”

From the early days of his career, Elvis’ signature style frequently incorporated unorthodox details that signified his individualistic taste… and his ability to afford such individualism. Often, this would mean clothing more off-the-wall than off-the-peg, such as the short, collarless jackets he wears across his performances in Viva Las Vegas, which may look great on the King but would not translate to your everyday dresser.

For this sequence, Elvis’ offbeat sartorial sensibilities converged with Sy Devore’s mastery of timeless tailoring in the form of a stylish suit that’s just different enough to belong in Elvis’ wardrobe.

Constructed from a sharp gray sharkskin wool, the suit has a single-breasted jacket that follows the styling queues of a dinner jacket, specifically the narrow shawl collar (albeit self-faced rather than silk as one would find on evening-wear), a ventless back, and a single-button front. True, the latter two were increasingly fashionable for lounge suits of the ’60s, but the shawl collar is a particularly eye-catching way for the star to add distinctive detailing to his suits without going to the extreme of excising the collar altogether (as later seen on his beige linen suit.)

Tailored to flatter with padded shoulders and front darts, the jacket otherwise follows the traditional style points of a welted breast pocket and jetted hip pockets, the lack of flaps harmonizing with the shawl collar and single-button front to create a sleek, minimal effect. The sleeves are finished with three buttons on each cuff.

Elvis’ pale slate-blue cotton shirt coordinates with his suit as a generally standard garment with a slightly modified collar to establish a degree of uniqueness, in this case a semi-spread collar rounded at the ends without approaching the extreme of an old-fashioned club collar.

The shirt has a plain “French-style” front and button cuffs, wisely chosen to avoid the threat of French cuffs interfering with his guitar-playing. He wears a straight navy tie, knotted with a four-in-hand and held in place with a silver tie bar a few inches above the jacket’s single button.

Elvis’ screen-worn suit trousers, source: Graceland Auctions.

The suit’s matching flat front trousers continue the minimalist effect of the jacket, sparsely detailed aside from the sliding buckle-tab adjusters rigged on each side of the waistband to ensure a comfortable fit in lieu of belt or braces.

The trousers have a high rise to meet the jacket’s single buttoning point, and the square-ended extended waistband tab closes on the front through a hidden hook-and-eye closure. There are no back pockets, and the side pockets are cut with a gentle slant and a slim welt along the opening.

To see more of the trousers, check out this Graceland listing from when they were auctioned four years ago during Elvis Week. The label confirms their Sy Devore provenance as well as the date of July 25, 1963, just one day before production wrapped in Las Vegas and moved to L.A. According to the listing, the trousers are 40.5″ long.

The trouser legs taper down to plain-hemmed bottoms, which break high over the black suede Chelsea boots that Elvis wears through most of Viva Las Vegas. All black, including the elastic side gussets, the boots have a slightly raised heel that makes the 6’0″ Elvis appear even taller as he strides aside the Flamingo pool.

Lucky wore a similarly styled suit with a shawl-collar, single-button jacket for his wedding to Rusty in the finale, though in a more somber black. According to the Christie’s auction listing for this suit, the cloth is a linen blend, which would have allowed the dark cloth to be lighter-wearing in the heat of a Las Vegas summer. (The listing also confirms the size as 42 long.)

He wears this black suit with an eggshell white shirt that has another rounded-end collar. The slim silver silk tie is held in place with a simple clip at mid-torso, though the lower button stance of this jacket can’t keep the tie blade from sliding out over the button. To celebrate the happy occasion, Lucky accents his appearance with a white carnation boutonnière on his lapel and a silver silk pocket square, likely matching his tie.

For the sake of anyone who may not have expected the ending despite the formulaic nature of the King’s filmography, I added a “spoiler warning” tag to the top of this post… though the ending would have been spoiled for readers of tabloid magazines like Movie Life that ran photos from filming the wedding scene, claiming that Elvis and Ann-Margret’s real-life romance had advanced to the point of marriage!

The Gun

After hitting all the major casinos, Lucky and the Count arrive at the Swingers Club, hosting a convention of rambunctious Texans. Exhibiting what would be a double-whammy of poor decisions if made in real life, Lucky grabs a set of single-action revolvers from a cowboy’s holster, dons the man’s hat, and fires a few rounds into the air to get the group’s attention… eventually luring everyone out of the casino by leading them in rounds of “The Yellow Rose of Texas” and “The Eyes of Texas Are Upon You”.

Only the dealer in the string-tie to Elvis’ left appears appropriately concerned with the patron who just grabbed another patron’s set of revolvers and is now firing them into the air.

The ivory-gripped six-shooters in question appear to be a set of Colt Single Action Army revolvers, the ubiquitous “Peacemaker” made famous by countless Westerns as well as its real-life role as the chosen smoke-wagon for Wild West figures on all sides of the law, from Wyatt Earp to Pancho Villa. Introduced in 1873, the Single Action Army has risen to an iconic status in Americana, the result of its decades of famous use and its elegant yet reliable design.

Elvis Presley in Viva Las Vegas (1964)

How to Get the Look

Even with a renowned tailor like Sy Devore, Elvis Presley sought to sartorially distinguish himself from his stylish contemporaries with subtle yet remarkable details like the incorporation of a shawl collar on this sleek gray sharkskin suit.

• Gray sharkskin tailored suit:
  • Single-button jacket with shawl collar, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and ventless back
  • Flat front trousers with buckle-tab side adjusters, slim-welted slanted side pockets, and plain-hemmed bottoms
• Pale slate-blue cotton shirt with rounded semi-spread collar, plain front, and button cuffs
• Navy straight tie
• Silver tie clip
• Black suede Chelsea boots with black elastic side gussets
• Black socks

With his sleek tailored gray suit with single-breasted jacket and side-adjuster trousers, worn with a pale blue shirt and navy tie, this Viva Las Vegas outfit could be argued as the King’s take on what Sean Connery had established as 007’s “uniform” in the first several James Bond movies produced across the early ’60s.

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The post Viva Las Vegas: Elvis’ Gray Shawl-Collar Suit appeared first on BAMF Style.

Robert Redford as John Gage in Indecent Proposal (1993)

Vitals

Robert Redford as John Gage, smooth billionaire and proposer of indecency

Off the coast of Santa Barbara, California, Summer 1993

Film: Indecent Proposal
Release Date: April 7, 1993
Director: Adrian Lyne
Costume Design: Beatrix Aruna Pasztor, Bernie Pollack, & Bobbie Read

Background

Happy birthday, Robert Redford! To celebrate the screen legend and style icon turning 85 today, I asked my Instagram followers a few weeks ago which of Redford’s yet-uncovered looks I should cover in today’s post: his black tuxedo for his on-screen introduction in 1974’s The Great Gatsby or the cream Cerruti suit he wears for consummation of the eponymous Indecent Proposal. With more than 3,000 votes cast, it was a close race, but Indecent Proposal won by just over 70 votes.

For those who haven’t seen Indecent Proposal, Redford stars as super-billionaire John Gage who—rather than launching himself into space—offers to provide a struggling young couple, David and Diana, with one million dollars… in exchange for one night with Diana. The couple initially refuses, but their financial state inspires a change of heart as the two pragmatically approach their lawyer to draw up a contract. As Diana (Demi Moore) leaves for her “date” with Gage, David (Woody Harrelson) has yet another change of heart… but arrives too late to stop the two from flying on Gage’s helicopter to his yacht, anchored off the Santa Barbara coast.

Standing topside in a dress he purchased for the occasion, Diana remains rightfully bitter about the terms of her arrangement with Gage, who tells her “I bought you because you said you couldn’t be bought.” “I can’t be bought… we’re just gonna fuck as I understand it,” she corrects him.

What’d He Wear?

John Gage dresses almost exclusively within a tailored template inspired by Old Hollywood: double-breasted suits, crisp shirts with sharply pointed collars, and patterned ties. His yacht is no place for business dress, so he leaves the conservative navy and gray suits in his closet with his white shirts and dresses appropriately for a summer evening at sea.

Shortly before Indecent Proposal‘s release, Roger Tredre of The Independent spoke with Bernie Pollack, one of the trio credited with the film’s costume design and a longtime collaborator with Redford, who confirmed that elegance was the key for the actor’s on-screen suits, all sourced from Italian designer Nino Cerruti’s Cerruti 1881 label. “We had to be careful not to make Bob’s character look like a sleazy high roller,” Pollack explained.

Gage stands relaxed but proud at the rail of his yacht in a cream suit that, aside from its startling off-white color, follows the mold of his previously observed trio of suits. The softness of the creamy shade and Redford’s own easygoing charisma help Gage skirt the concern cited by Sir Hardy Amies that “it is difficult in a white suit to have the air of nonchalance that I think real good dressing requires.”

While some of Gage’s double-breasted jackets have the more contemporary six-on-one button configuration, this suit is rigged with a more classic six-on-two button front, though he only buttons the top of the two, arguably correct but still with enough of a laidback air that Redford finds that rare balance between nonchalance and good dressing that the aforementioned Sir Hardy had celebrated in his 1964 volume ABCs of Men’s Fashion.

The tailoring flatters Redford as well as Gage’s smoothly domineering persona, powerfully padded across the wide shoulders, shaped with darts through the body, and gently suppressed at the waist, with the ventless back further serving his lean physique. The straight jetted pockets offer no flaps to collide with the additional ornamentation of a double-breasted jacket, and Gage dresses the welted breast pocket with a brown paisley silk pocket square that coordinates with his tie while avoiding the direct match that some would consider gauche.

Despite the financial transaction driving the evening’s events, Gage hardly considers this a business dealing and leaves the office-ready worsteds behind. Most clearly seen in silhouette when the ship’s lights turn on Gage against the night sky, the cream suiting’s softly napped finish suggests the luxurious possibilities of worsted cashmere or a wool and mohair blend.

Redford’s screen-worn shirts were made by his usual shirtmaker, Anto Beverly Hills, who followed the aesthetic of his tailoring to create strong and stylish shirts with “golden era”-inspired detailing, specifically razor-sharp spearpoint collars. Rather than wearing one of his usual white shirts, Gage selects a sky-blue cotton shirt that serves to both “dress down” this off-hours look while also creating an interesting and nautical-inspired contrast against the off-white suiting.

“I would have liked to have used French cuffs,” Pollack recalled in The Independent, “but this might have implied a slickness that wasn’t right for the character.” Thus, the shirt has button-fastened barrel cuffs, a front placket, and likely a breast pocket to be consistent with his other shirts.

Gage’s olive brown tie follows the patterned neckwear trends of the ’90s, overlaid with dark blue cross-hatched lines, occasionally broken up by amoebic green and bronze blob-like shapes, all bordered in the same dark blue. Auctions and other sources have cited Armani as a significant purveyor of Redford’s screen-worn ties in Indecent Proposal, so it’s likely that this it is also from Armani.

The top of his suit’s matching trousers remain mostly covered by his buttoned jacket and, as we’re not in his stateroom later to witness its discard, we can only imagine it’s styled like his other suit trousers with belt loops, single pleats, side pockets, and button-through back pockets.

The bottoms are finished with turn-ups (cuffs), breaking high over what appear to be dark brown leather lace-up dress shoes.

Gage’s right hand is dressed with jewelry, including the silver tribal ring that Redford had been gifted by Hopis in 1966 and which he has worn in nearly every film appearance since then. Gage’s wristwatch is an elegant gold tank watch with a white square dial, secured to a dark brown leather strap.

Gage produces his lucky coin, likely so named for its 100% success rate in helping him get lucky.

The suit, shirt, and tie can be seen more clearly in Martin Barker’s photographs for The Columbus Dispatch of the costume on display last month at the Decorative Arts Center of Ohio.

How to Get the Look

Robert Redford as John Gage in Indecent Proposal (1993)

Robert Redford’s tailoring in Indecent Proposal recalls the elegance of the “golden era” of menswear half a century earlier, updated to reflect contemporary sensibilities and made contextually appropriate via his off-white styling and sky-blue shirt for a summer evening on the water.

• Cream napped suit:
  • Double-breasted 6×2-button jacket with wide peak lapels, welted breast pocket, straight jetted hip pockets, and ventless back
  • Single-pleated trousers with belt loops, side pockets, button-through back pockets, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Sky-blue cotton shirt with long point collar, front placket, breast pocket, and button cuffs
• Olive (with blue streaks and blue-bordered “amoebic” shapes) tie
• Dark brown leather lace-up dress shoes
• Silver tribal ring
• Gold tank watch with white square dial on dark brown leather strap

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

Who made the decision?

The post Indecent Proposal: Robert Redford Tailored in Cream Cerruti appeared first on BAMF Style.

Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum in a promotional shot for Magnum, P.I.

Vitals

Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum, private investigator and former Navy SEAL

Hawaii, early 1980s

Series: Magnum, P.I., seasons 2 through 6
Creator: Donald P. Bellisario & Glen Larson
Costume Supervisor: James Gilmore

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Happy Aloha Friday! While the tradition of ending the workweek with a Hawaiian shirt dates back to the ’60s, today is a particularly significant Aloha Friday as the third Friday in August is observed as Statehood Day in Hawaii, commemorating Hawaii’s admission to the United States in August 1959.

Servicemen returning from the Pacific after World War II had an early role in introducing the colorful and tropical style of the Hawaiian islands to the continental U.S., aided over the following decades by movies like the Oscar-winning From Here to Eternity and the Elvis vehicle Blue Hawaii, but I would argue that few productions have been as impactful as bringing Aloha style mainstream as Magnum, P.I.

For the first eight celebrated years of the ’80s, Tom Selleck starred as the self-described “world-class private investigator,” living maika’i ola on a lush Oahu estate with a zippy red Ferrari and an imperious majordomo at his disposal. Episodes ranged from light-hearted adventures to gravely serious drama, the latter often driven by the trauma of Magnum’s shared experiences serving in Vietnam with his pals Rick (Larry Manetti) and T.C. (Roger E. Mosley), and the series broke ground by highlighting the complex struggles of Vietnam veterans and prisoners of war.

As fans of the series know, there’s far more to Thomas Magnum than just a Ferrari, a Tigers hat, and one of the most notorious mustaches in Hollywood history. Over the course of its eight seasons, the show gradually explores more of Magnum’s background, from his battle-hardened years as a Navy SEAL and POW to the troubled circumstances around his wartime marriage, which becomes the focus of the two-part episode “Memories Are Forever”.

Is it customary for Hawaiian state ID photos to be taken outside?
Prominent shots of Magnum’s license in “Memories Are Forever” establish his date of birth to be January 5, 1946, which alternately aligns and conflicts with other evidence of his birthday across the series.)

Sunsets in Hawaii really are different, warmer, intenser, more romantic than anywhere I know in the world… that is, if you have a girl. If you don’t, sunsets in Hawaii can be depressing, and when you’re depressed there’s only one thing to do: lose yourself in your work, which⁠—for me⁠—happened to be a divorce case.

Airing early in Magnum, P.I.‘s second season, “Memories Are Forever” may be one of the first great episodes of the series, introducing viewers to Michelle (Marta DuBois), the nurse Magnum had married during the war and believed to be killed during the evacuation of Saigon in 1975. During his investigation into what starts as a relatively routine divorce case, Magnum spies a woman he believes to be Michelle, despite the fact that he believed her to have been dead for more than six years.

What’d He Wear?

The Calla Lily Shirt

In addition to its plot and exploration of Thomas Magnum’s background, “Memories Are Forever” is also sartorially significant for debuting one of Magnum’s most recognized shirts, a purple Aloha shirt emblazoned with a large-scaled Calla Lily tropical floral print.

Made of 100% rayon, the purple shirt’s large all-over floral pattern consists of calla lilies with ice-white petals and golden leaves. Consistent with aloha shirt tradition, the shirt has short sleeves, relaxed camp collar (or “revere collar”), and six natural wood buttons up the plain “French placket” front. Unlike the currently offered shirts from Paradise Found, the screen-worn Calla Lily shirts have a non-matching breast pocket, meaning that the cloth to create the pocket was placed without attempting to create an “unbroken” effect.

“Memories Are Forever, Part 1” (Episode 2.05)

“According to Pacific Clothing Company (the manufacturer of this shirt) Tom Selleck himself came to their showroom in downtown Honolulu back in the 1980s and personally picked out this shirt,” describes AlohaFunWear in their listing for the famous shirt, currently made by Paradise Found. (AlohaFunWear proudly sells an impressive lineup of shirts featured on both the original 1980s Magnum, P.I. as well as the modern reboot starring Jay Hernandez; this is one of several shirts worn in both shows.)

Appearing in 17 episodes from the second season through the end of the sixth season, the “Calla Lily” grew to recognition due to its frequent use on the series as well as in promotional photography for the show. By midway through the series, Magnum’s aloha style had become so associated with the character that it was often the subject of meta-commentary, such as in the episode “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12) when Robin Masters is hosting—among others—a couple cosplaying as Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald for a roaring ’20s murder mystery-themed weekend. “Great costume!” Zelda comments, to which Magnum responds, “oh, this isn’t a costume.” With some judgement, the well-tailored “F. Scott” clarifies, “Really? You wear that shirt in public?”

Magnum reacts to F. Scott Fitzgerald calling out his decidedly un-Jazz Age-approved Calla Lily print in “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12).

Jeans, Pants, and Shorts

Magnum almost always wears his aloha shirts tucked in, whether he’s wearing jeans or shorts. He almost always holds up both with a khaki webbed cotton belt in the style that he would have worn with his Navy uniforms. Given that the Calla Lily shirt makes its first appearance during the second season, Magnum has already upgraded his gold box-frame friction buckle to one with the U.S. Navy Surface Warfare emblem and “MAGNUM” embossed in gold.

“Photo Play” (Episode 6.21)

Across the shirt’s trio of second-season appearances, Magnum tucks it into his unique blue denim dungarees, a full-fitting style of jeans inspired by early 20th century naval workwear with two patch pockets on the front and two patch pockets on the back, as well as belt loops for his khaki web belt.

“Tropical Madness” (Episode 2.07)

For later appearances of the Calla Lily shirt, specifically in “The Man from Marseilles” (Episode 5.20) and “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04), Magnum’s jeans are a lighter blue denim wash from Levi’s with the recognizable “red tab” sewn along the inside of the back-right patch pocket.

In “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04), Magnum wears the Calla Lily aloha shirt during a deadly serious moment that finds him belittled as a mere “beach boy”.

“The Kona Winds” also finds Magnum uniquely sporting an aloha shirt and jeans with his navy linen blazer, perhaps to fit his guise as an L.A. insurance rep visiting the islands or merely to add another layer of warmth or protection against the titular cyclone.

Aloha shirts aren’t typically worn with sports coats or tailored jackets; indeed, this potential faux pas threatens to defeat the purpose of aloha shirts, which were partially developed as informal business attire in Hawaii, yet Magnum would repeat this again several more times over the sixth season, including one instance with the iconic red “jungle bird” shirt.

After almost a decade of living in Hawaii, Magnum would almost certainly be aware of the incongruity of wearing his blazer over an aloha shirt, so I suspect the garment’s appearance was merely to reinforce his posing as an unaware insurance representative who needs to bullshit his way past Cindy, a flustered and frustrated Judy Blume-reading secretary at the Bank of Honolulu.

Made from a rich navy blue linen, flatteringly cut with padded shoulders, suppressed waist, and a long single vent, the single-breasted blazer has substantial notch lapels with “swelled” welted edges, rolling down to two crested gilt buttons that echo the four buttons on each cuff. In addition to a welted breast pocket, the blazer also has flapped bellows pockets over the hips, an even sportier detail than regular patch pockets.

“The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04)

In “Little Games” (Episode 5.12), Magnum strolls into the back office at the King Kamehameha club, where Rick is suspiciously surprised that Magnum isn’t contesting the invoice for repairs to his damaged sweater before returning to Robin’s Nest in time to meet insurance security specialist Krista Villaroch (Jenny Agutter) and rescue her from the police who mistakenly believe she was trying to break into the estate.

Throughout the evening, Magnum wears his Calla Lily shirt tucked into a pair of off-white cotton flat front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, and back pockets that close through a button-down flap.

“Little Games” (Episode 5.12)

Recuperating from a mysterious accident in the Ferrari, Magnum stumbles around Robin’s Nest in “Try to Remember” (Episode 2.15) with the Calla Lily printed shirt worn open over a pair of short tan shorts, of which we don’t see much aide from the squared extended waist tab that appears to close through a hidden hook-and-eye. He carries (but doesn’t wear) his Tigers hat, and he wears a pair of brown leather boat shoes that deviate from the lighter-colored pair he tends to wear with this shirt.

“Try to Remember” (Episode 2.15)

Beginning the following season with the finale of “Foiled Again” (Episode 3.08), Magnum begins regularly wearing a pair of oft-seen khaki cotton shorts, also with a short inseam. The shorts’ single reverse-facing pleats meets the top of each slanting front pocket and the forward-most belt loop, and there are two patch pockets on the back with a small black manufacturer’s tab sewn along the top right seam of the back-right pocket.

Magnum wears these shorts again at the close of “Of Sound Mind” (Episode 3.13) when the eccentric millionaire Wilson MacLeish (Donnelly Rhodes) is being held “at gunpoint” by his frustrated former butler Carlton (Roscoe Lee Browne)… in fact a prearranged practical joke between Magnum and Carlton to teach the wealthy prankster a lesson. Once again, Magnum wears this outfit while in recovery, this time with his right leg in a cast.

Carlton and Magnum confront MacLeish in “Of Sound Mind” (Episode 3.13).

Magnum brings back these khaki shorts in “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12), beginning with beachside coffee and breakfast with Rick and T.C. at the King Kamehameha club, where Magnum explains that—after Higgins was waylaid by an exploding croquet ball (you had to be there)—Magnum’s now responsibly for organizing “the ’20s costume party for the idle rich of the ’80s” at Robin’s Nest. He returns home only to find many early arrivals, including a pair of Douglas Fairbanks and John Barrymore cosplayers sword-fighting in the foyer as well as the judgmental Fitzgeralds upstairs. Luckily, Robin’s new assistant Valerie (Colleen Camp) is there to set things straight… in a way.

Magnum continues to wear these shorts across the fifth and sixth seasons as well, particularly in “Under World” (Episode 5.05), “Let Me Hear the Music” (Episode 5.18), “Find Me a Rainbow” (Episode 6.18), and with the shirt’s final appearance in the final scene of “Photo Play” (Episode 6.21).

During a Jazz Age-themed party at Robin’s Nest that finds his beloved Calla Lily shirt insulted by no less than F. Scott Fitzgerald (okay maybe a little less since it wasn’t actually the long-dead author), Magnum takes refuge with Valerie (Colleen Camp) in “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12).

The third season also features the Calla Lily shirt worn tucked into a pair of white cotton double forward-pleated shorts with a high rise and wide belt loops that remain unused every time Magnum wears these shorts. Also detailed with side pockets, these shorts appear at the end of “Flashback” (Episode 3.07), during a brief vignette in “Two Birds of a Feather” (Episode 3.20), and at the end of “Faith and Begorrah” (Episode 3.23).

Magnum banters with Rick and T.C. at the end of “Flashback” (Episode 3.07).

Magnum diverges from wearing white or khaki shorts in “Rembrandt’s Girl” (Episode 4.14), when he’s interrupted during saxophone practice by Susan Johnson (Carol Burnett), gifting him a new plate after their shared adventure locked in a bank vault for much of the episode. During this brief vignette that ends the episode, he tucks the shirt into a pair of light sage-gray shorts detailed with straight jetted front pockets, a back-right patch pocket, covered button-fly front, and a self-belted waistband with side adjusters.

Susan gives Magnum a plate in “Rembrandt’s Girl” (Episode 4.14). Note the red “jungle bird” shirt slung over the banister in the background between them.

After going nearly 48 hours without sleep in “Memories Are Forever”, having been distracted by his search for Michelle, Magnum goes swimming to relieve his mind but ends up unwittingly carrying out his end of his latest deal with Higgins, allowing himself to be chased by “the lads” for their exercise. Luckily, he’s interrupted by his pal Mac (Jeff MacKay), who brings a reluctant Magnum his khaki U.S. Navy service uniform so that he can testify back in D.C. about his old unit in ‘Nam on one condition: Magnum has to officially return to active duty to testify, only to be released after testifying when he’d be promoted to full Commander.

The Navy can’t just pop into my life and say “anchors aweigh!”

Magnum dresses for his dip in the ocean in dark navy elastic-waisted swim trunks with a short inseam and a pocket on the right side that closes with a button-down flap, wearing the Calla Lily shirt and his signature Detroit Tigers baseball cap with the full rig.

A despondent Magnum returns from a swim in “Memories Are Forever” (Episode 2.05).

Aside from the brown leather boat shoes he wears when laid up in “Try to Remember” (Episode 2.15), Magnum typically wears light taupe suede boat shoes with the Calla Lily shirt.

The history of boat shoes dates to the mid-1930s, when American yachtsman and outdoorsman Paul A. Sperry took inspiration from his dog’s paws to develop the innovative “non-slip” siped soles that would become a signature characteristic the deck-friendly shoes that would become the Sperry Top-Sider. With their moccasin-stitched construction and side lacing, these low, derby-style lace-ups were embraced beyond seafarers to be embraced by the prep crowd. By the 1980s, boat shoes had been firmly established as the casual footwear of choice for pop culture icons ranging from action heroes like James Bond to TV staples like Sam Malone and Thomas Magnum.

Magnum’s light taupe boat shoes, seen mostly clearly in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04) but featured in at least five episodes across the four seasons leading up to it, have softly napped suede uppers with matching rawhide laces through two sets of white plastic eyelets.

Magnum recounts to a disinterested bikini-clad beauty a science teacher who told him he would never understand “the importance of geometrical objects” given Magnum’s romantic fascination with rainbows… until he’s interrupted by his new potential client in “Find Me a Rainbow” (Episode 6.18).

The Hats

Magnum frequently pays tribute to his—and Tom Selleck’s—hometown baseball team by wearing a navy cotton twill baseball cap emblazoned with a white embroidered “D” in the Middle English blackletter typeface, the longtime logo for the Detroit Tigers. As with all MLB teams, the Tigers’ caps are widely available (including from Amazon) though they’re considerably more popular than many other teams due to their association with Magnum, P.I.

Not including the curious appearance of a downsized Tigers hat in the closing moments of “Flashback” (Episode 3.07), Magnum wears his navy Tigers caps with the Calla Lily shirt in “Try to Remember” (Episode 2.15), “Of Sound Mind” (Episode 3.13), “Faith and Begorrah” (Episode 3.23), and “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12).

By the fourth season, specifically “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12) here, Magnum has his trio of signature accessories established—POW/MIA bracelet, team ring, and Rolex “Pepsi” GMT Master—as well as his go-to Detroit Tigers cap.

Magnum also wears another kind of “Tigers” cap in the series, as seen in the final scene of “Flashback” (Episode 3.07) as he chats with Rick and T.C. while wearing a red cotton “trucker cap” with a white mesh back and a round patch on the front with “TIGERS” placed in the center of a white circle that otherwise touts the services of “Al’s Automotive and Muffler King”. According to the forums at Magnum Mania, Selleck had first worn this hat in the 1979 made-for-TV movie The Chinese Typewriter, in which he and James Whitmore Jr. starred as a pair of private detectives in Hawaii.

A different kind of Tigers, Selleck dusted off the Al’s Automotive cap he had worn in a little-seen TV movie the year before Magnum, P.I. premiere, seen here at the end of “Flashback” (Episode 3.07).

Magnum cycled through a number of baseball caps on the series, but the most frequently seen in addition to his Tigers caps was a hat commemorating his service with Marine Observation Squadron 2 (VMO-2). Also constructed of navy twill, the cap has a dark navy patch on the front with “VMO2” and “DA NANG” above and below a yellow-embroidered eagle.

The hat makes frequent appearances throughout Magnum, P.I., but Magnum only wears it with his Calla Lily shirt when he and Rick arrive at the hospital where T.C. is in a coma, appropriately choosing it when showing up to support his former brother-in-arms.

Magnum appropriately wears his VMO2 DA NANG service cap when in the hospital to support his fellow vet T.C. in “Under World” (Episode 5.05).

Accessories

After more than a season of Magnum, T.C., and Rick wearing their gold team rings, the significance is made clear in “Memories Are Forever, Part 1” (Episode 2.05) when Higgins spots something curious on Michelle’s necklace from Magnum’s surveillance photos: “I say! That’s the same French croix you have on your ring.”

Also known as a double cross or patriarchal cross, the Croix de Lorraine (“Cross of Lorraine”) emerged as a symbol of resistance in wartime France. Magnum, T.C., and Rick—and some of those in their orbit—each wear large gold rings with these gold crosses set in black enamel, with Magnum wearing his on the third finger of his right hand from the second season through the end of the series.

Magnum adjusts his own croix de Lorraine ring after spotting it on Michelle’s necklace in “Memories Are Forever, Part 1” (Episode 2.05).

Through the first three seasons of Magnum, P.I., including in flashbacks to Vietnam, Magnum wears a stainless steel Chronosport Sea Quartz 30 dive watch, likely chosen to reflect the actual Chronosports worn by select Navy SEALs during the early ’70s. Worn on a black tropic rubber strap, Magnum’s Chronosport Sea Quartz 30 has a slim black tick-marked rotating bezel, a black dial with luminescent markers and numerals for 12, 6, and 9 o’clock with a black day-date window at 3:00. Episodes that show close-ups of the watch reveal it to be a pre-1982 model that just says “Quartz” on the dial before Chronosport added the full “Sea Quartz 30” designation on the dial.

Magnum suffers the strain of tropical madness in “Tropical Madness” (Episode 2.07).

Beginning with the excellent fourth season premiere episode “Home from the Sea”, Magnum’s watch is retconned to be a Rolex GMT Master that is established as having belonged to his aviator father, bequeathed to young Thomas following his father’s death during the Korean War. Thus, the watch’s origins are somewhat anachronistic as the GMT Master wasn’t launched until the mid-1950s, following a collaboration between Rolex and Pan Am as the watch would be issued to Pan Am pilots and navigators. In tribute to Selleck’s famous timepiece, Jay Hernandez wears a newer Rolex GMT Master II in the recent reboot of Magnum, P.I.

Selleck wears the eye-catching “Pepsi” GMT Master, so named in reference to the blue-and-red bidirectional bezel. Some debate has endured as to whether or not the screen-worn watch was a ref. 1675 or the ref. 16750, with Danny Milton providing evidence for the latter in the March 2021 Hodinkee article, “Why The Rolex GMT-Master Pepsi Is The Perfect Watch For Magnum P.I.“ Milton points out that the ref. 16750’s production timeline of 1980 to 1988 perfectly matches with the series run, which would be anachronistic for Magnum being gifted the watch in childhood… though this issue is already moot considering that the GMT Master itself was anachronistic anyway!

Worn on a steel “Oyster”-style three-piece link bracelet, Magnum’s stainless GMT Master has a black matte dial with painted non-numeric hour markers and a date window at the 3:00 position. Selleck himself was a fan of the GMT Master, keeping the screen-worn watch after the series ended and explaining that:

I’ve always loved that watch. It was the perfect match for Magnum. It’s a watch that likes action, and believe me I know what I’m talking about. I’ve had my fair share of “sport” watches but never one as tough as the Rolex. It’s been underwater, buried in sand, taken I don’t know how many knocks, and never a problem. It’s called the Pepsi because the bezel colors are the same as the Pepsi logo. Personally, I thought the red went well with the Ferrari and the blue matched Hawaii’s lagoons and sky.

Distraught again, this time following a heartbreaking betrayal in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.12).

Magnum began wearing his silver POW/MIA bracelet around the same time as the Rolex GMT Master, though he actually started wearing it in the eighteenth episode of the third season, thus it made its first appearance with the Calla Lily shirt in “Two Birds of a Feather” (Episode 3.20).

The POW/MIA bracelet program was launched on Veterans Day 1970, beginning a nationwide practice of wearing bracelets to increase awareness of and remember service members who were prisoners of war or missing in action. The simple silver bracelets are engraved with the service member’s name, rank, and the date they were taken prisoner or listed as missing. Magnum’s bracelet honors Kenneth Ray Lancaster, a U.S. Army Staff Sergeant from Maryland who was listed as missing on January 3, 1969.

SSGT Kenneth Ray Lancaster’s engraved name can be clearly seen on Magnum’s POW/MIA bracelet as he makes calls in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04).

By the time Magnum was rotating the Calla Lily aloha shirt through his collection, his favorite sunglasses had been well-established as the sporty tortoise nylon-framed Vuarnet Skilynx Acier model, often worn around his neck on a thin cord, alternating between blue, black, and red cords over the course of the series.

Paradise is no place to be without sunglasses, as demonstrated by the cord that keeps Magnum’s Vuarnets always close in “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian” (Episode 4.12).

The Guns

As a celebrated Navy SEAL, Magnum had extensive experience with the classic M1911A1 service pistol, which had served all branches of the U.S. military from the 1920s through well into the 1980s. Though Magnum’s sidearm is likely meant to be his service .45, the production instead armed Tom Selleck with a Colt MK IV Series 70 Government Model, a commercial variant of the venerated single-action semi-automatic pistol. In fact, not only is Magnum’s pistol not a military-issue piece, it’s also chambered in 9×19 mm Parabellum rather than the powerful .45 ACP caliber traditionally associated with the 1911.

Magnum pulls his 1911A1 from its well-worn leather holster in his nightstand in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04).

A firearms enthusiast with military experience from his six-year service with the California Army National Guard, Tom Selleck has been a longtime proponent of the 1911 design, particularly the Smith & Wesson SW1911SC Gunsite Edition that he carried in all eight of the Jesse Stone film series as well as the NBC TV series Las Vegas. You can read more about Selleck’s extensive history with on-screen (and off-screen) firearms at IMFDB.

A screen-used Colt from Magnum, P.I. was included as Lot 152 in a June 2007 auction from the Stembridge Armory Collection, where it was described in the catalog as: “Colt MK IV Series 70 Gov’t Model semi-auto pistol, 9mm Luger cal., 5” barrel, #70L33101. The barrel is adapted for firing blanks, approx. 95% blue finish remaining with slight holster wear, checkered brown plastic grips, correct Colt 9mm Luger marked magazine.”

Magnum checks the load in his 1911A1. The Sting-like gambit at the end of “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04) implies that Magnum is able to swap out a live magazine for one filled with blanks—similar to the plot of Die Hard 2—though this isn’t how semi-automatic pistols function.

Magnum also handles several other firearms while clad in the Calla Lily shirt, particularly the Tokarev pistol he takes from his Vietnamese interrogators in “Memories Are Forever” (Episode 2.05). “This look familiar?” he asks Rick, who responds, “Yeah, it’s a Tokarev Star 9mm. North Vietnamese regulars carried it.”

As its name would suggest, the Tokarev was developed by the Russians in the early 1930s to replace the aging Nagant revolvers. Following tests conducted by the Revolutionary Military Council, a semi-automatic pistol design from Fedor Tokarev was accepted and quickly adopted as the TT-30 in Soviet service, quickly supplanted by the improved TT-33 with more than a million produced by the end of World War II.

The original proprietary round favored by the Russians was the 7.62×25 mm Tokarev, though many variants produced or imported by foreign users rebarreled the pistol for the more universal 9×19 mm Parabellum round. The Chinese factory Norinco was one of the most prominent non-Russian producers of the Tokarev pistol, though—as Rick notes—the North Vietnamese were also significant adopters of the pistol.

Rick recognizes the Tokarev that Magnum grabbed from their captors in “Memories Are Forever, Part 1” (Episode 2.05).

In “Of Sound Mind” (Episode 3.13), Magnum arranges a prank with the disgruntled butler Carlton (Roscoe Lee Browne) that involves Carlton holding his eccentric employer at gunpoint. Magnum takes the gun and then, after some thinking, pulls the trigger on their shocked victim… only for the man to be blasted with a stream of dirty water.

The “water gun” in question is the Colt Bisley, a target model of the venerated Single Action Army “Peacemaker” revolver. Named for the Bisley firing range in England, the Colt Bisley can be visually differentiated from classic Peacemakers by its distinctively shaped and elongated grip. The Bisley was introduced in 1894 during a time when industrialization and urbanization were catching up with the untamed west, and it provided a more sophisticated alternative for those still wishing to carry a six-shooter with their city clothes. Just under 45,000 were manufactured across its 21-year production timeline, in calibers ranging from .32-20 Winchester up to .455 Eley, including the venerable .45 Long Colt round.

To be fair, that is one very convincing water gun.

What to Imbibe

Magnum rarely drinks on the job, avowing to a personal rule to avoid it unless his hand is forced as seen when his potential new client Lydia McCarthy (Julia Montgomery) insists on it in “Find Me a Rainbow” (Episode 6.18). Aside from the fictional Old Dusseldorf referenced as his favorite in “No More Mr. Nice Guy” (Episode 4.13), Magnum’s arguably most imbibed brew is the equally fictional Coops, undoubtedly a riff on the real-life Coors brand right down to its golden-hued label suggesting the yellow branding of Coors Banquet.

Coops for recuperation in “Try to Remember” (Episode 2.15).

“If you can’t bring Magnum to the party, then bring the party to Magnum!” exclaims gregarious Hawaiian entertainer “Big Ed” Kanakoa (Dick Jensen), who shows up in the back office of the King Kamehameha club with a pitcher when he notices Magnum blew off Rick’s indoor luau in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04).

Magnum ignores the tall hurricane glass that Big Ed fills with the cyanic concoction, which appears to be the famous Blue Hawaii cocktail.

On a serious job in “The Kona Winds” (Episode 6.04), Magnum doesn’t take Big Ed up on enjoying what appears to be a tall Blue Hawaii.

Hilton Hawaiian Village head bartender Harry Yee developed the Blue Hawaii in 1957 in response to a request from Bols that would include blue Curaçao liqueur to such a degree that the drink itself would turn blue. The potent recipe includes light rum, vodka, blue Curaçao, and freshly made sour mix, with pineapple juice providing the other half… give or take an ounce here or there as too much pineapple juice will turn it green!

Poured into a hurricane glass—apropos the titular kona storm in the episode featuring this drink—the traditional serve is on the rocks, though the Blue Hawaii can also be blended and served frozen, though the final product is almost always given a festive finish with a pineapple slice, maraschino cherry, and cocktail umbrella.

Tom Selleck touts the series’ tropical spirit in a promotional photo for Magnum, P.I. I don’t believe he ever wears this combination on screen… nor does he ever drink from a pineapple.

How to Get the Look

Tom Selleck as Thomas Magnum on Magnum, P.I., Episode 4.12: “The Case of the Red-Faced Thespian”

Among Thomas Magnum’s colorful wardrobe, the Calla Lily remains one of the most recognizable aloha shirts due to its eye-catching print and ubiquity, featured in a variety of memorable episodes across four of the show’s eight seasons and frequently appointed with Magnum’s signature accessories such as his Detroit Tigers cap and inherited Rolex GMT Master “Pepsi” watch.

• Purple “Calla Lily” floral-patterned rayon Aloha shirt by Paradise Found with camp collar, plain front (with 6 wood buttons), breast pocket, and short sleeves
  • Available via AlohaFunWear and Amazon
• Khaki cotton single reverse-pleated shorts with belt loops, slanted front pockets, and patch back pockets
• Khaki web belt with gold-tone USN “Surface Warfare” belt buckle
  • Available via Amazon
• Taupe suede two-eyelet Sperry Top-Sider boat shoes
  • Available via Amazon
• Detroit Tigers baseball cap in navy cotton twill with white-embroidered logo
  • Available via Amazon
• Rolex GMT Master stainless steel watch with “Pepsi” blue-and-red bezel, black dial (with 3:00 day-date window), and stainless “Oyster”-style bracelet
• Silver POW/MIA bracelet
• Gold Croix de Lorraine team ring
  • Replicas available via Amazon
• Vuarnet Skilynx Acier tortoise nylon sport sunglasses

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the entire series, and peruse the extensively researched fan site Magnum Mania!

The Quote

Maybe every dream in paradise doesn’t have a happy ending… but this one did.

The post Magnum, P.I.: The Purple Calla Lily Aloha Shirt appeared first on BAMF Style.

Honor Blackman as Pussy Galore in Goldfinger (1964)

Vitals

Honor Blackman as Pussy Galore, a “damn good pilot”

Fort Knox, Kentucky, Fall 1964

Film: Goldfinger
Release Date: September 18, 1964
Director: Guy Hamilton
Wardrobe Supervisor: Elsa Fennell

Background

Today would have been the 96th birthday of the late Honor Blackman, best known for her role as Cathy Gale on the second and third seasons of The Avengers, which she left to star in her iconic performance in Goldfinger as Pussy Galore, the assertive aviator who transforms from enemy to ally of Sean Connery’s James Bond.

Arguably one of the most famous (and most famously named) women of the Bond franchise, the high-flying judo expert Pussy Galore established a new type of “Bond girl”, a tough, action-oriented equal rather than the demure damsel in distress. Pussy also nearly equals the stylish secret agent with her strong wardrobe, primarily comprised of tailored jackets and slacks, apropos her profession that still carried masculine connotations in the early 1960s.

What’d She Wear?

Several scenes after Mr. Bond himself sped through the Swiss countryside in his brown tweed sports coat and cavalry twill trousers, Pussy Galore debuted her own variation of the outfit for an afternoon at Auric Goldfinger’s stud farm in Kentucky, trading the coarse tweed for a softer but equally sporty corduroy and swapping 007’s shirt and tie for a more figure-friendly turtleneck.

Constructed from a warm tan medium-waled corduroy, Pussy’s thigh-length jacket has notch lapels that end high above a three-button front, as well as three-button cuffs and flapped hip pockets.

Similar to equestrian jackets, the corduroy jacket is tailored to flatter with structured shoulders, a pulled-in waist, and flared skirt that highlights Blackman’s hourglass figure. Even if Pussy’s clothing is initially coded more masculine, the tailoring still emphasizes her female figure… which would be further showcased when Goldfinger asks Pussy to change into clothing that would more entice Bond’s prurient interest.

Caught between Goldfinger and Bond, Pussy’s golden tones suggest her allegiance with Goldfinger… for now.

Pussy wears an oatmeal-colored melange turtleneck, woven in a soft, fine fabric, possibly merino wool. The sleeves have long, finely ribbed cuffs, and she wears the hem tucked into her high-rise trousers. When 007-approved knitwear brand N.Peal launched its cashmere collection inspired by 50 years of Bond, this particular sweater received an update as a mock-neck jumper made of sand-colored Mongolian cashmere.

Continuing the equestrian associations of her jacket, Pussy wears a pair of tight beige trousers similar to riding breeches, with a long rise and an extended waistband tab with a hidden hook-and-eye fastener. These pants have slanted front pockets but no back pockets, and they taper down each leg to the plain-hemmed bottoms which have gold-toned zippers extending up a few inches on the outside of each leg.

Pussy’s tan suede Chelsea boots have raised heels and brown elastic side gussets. When she reclines with Goldfinger to enjoy her mint julep, we get a glimpse of her hosiery, which appear to be black-and-white socks that diverge from the earthy tones in the rest of her outfit.

Not worn with this outfit but worth mentioning is Pussy’s Rolex GMT Master watch, which adds a sense of verisimilitude given her profession and the history of the GMT Master, which had been developed a decade earlier in collaboration with Pan Am so that pilots and navigators could have a reliable 24-hour timepiece while flying around the world.

Due to its use in Goldfinger, the ref. 6542 GMT Master has become known in the horological community as the “Rolex Pussy Galore”. As the first GMT Master, ref. 6542 was produced from 1954 to 1959 in a variety of metal, bezel, and dial combinations, but Pussy wears the all-stainless steel watch with the blue-and-red “Pepsi” bakelite bezel, stainless “Oyster”-style three-piece link bracelet, and black dial with luminous non-numeric hour markers and a 3:00 date window.

Before landing in Kentucky, Pussy helms Goldfinger’s private plane with a trusty Rolex GMT Master secured to her wrist.

To see another iconic GMT Master in action, check out last week’s post featuring Tom Selleck in Magnum, P.I.

The Guns

Before their landing in Kentucky, Bond emerges from the bathroom on Goldfinger’s personal plane only for Pussy Galore to greet him with a Smith & Wesson Model 22.

Pussy: Do you want to play it easy or the hard way? And this isn’t a tranquilizer gun.
Bond: Now, Pussy, you know a lot more about planes than guns. That’s a Smith & Wesson .45, and if you fire at me at this close range, the bullet will pass through me and the fuselage like a blowtorch through butter. The cabin will depressurize, and we’ll both be sucked into outer space together. If that’s how you want to enter the United States, you’re welcome. As for me, I prefer the easy way.
Pussy: That’s very sensible.

Aside from establishing the myth-busted science that would be revisited for Goldfinger‘s finale, the scene also provides Mr. Bond with one of his beloved opportunities to show off. Indeed, Pussy stands before him armed with a .45-caliber Smith & Wesson, specifically the Model 22, which was introduced in 1950 as a commercial evolution of the World War I-era M1917 revolver. The M1917 was a unique military revolver, referring to models produced by both Colt and Smith & Wesson to supplement the newly developed M1911 service pistols. Smith & Wesson adapted its .44 Hand Ejector to fit the rimless .45 ACP cartridge, which had been designed specifically for semi-automatic pistols like the 1911 series and thus required half-moon clips for easier loading.

Smith & Wesson continued production of the M1917 after the war, reintroducing this improved civilian version as the “Model 1950”, built on the company’s large N-frame and re-designated the Model 22 later in the decade. Like its predecessor, the Model 22 was loaded with half- and full-moon clips specifically to fit six rimless .45 ACP cartridges in the shortened cylinder.

Though Pussy isn’t armed when she and Goldfinger’s guards discover Bond has escaped from his room, her fast judo abilities land Bond flat on his face and his commandeered Walther P38 returned to her.

Seemingly the standard sidearm carried by Goldfinger’s henchmen, the 9mm P38 semi-automatic pistol was developed in Germany during the lead-up to World War II, intended to replace the iconic but aging Luger pistol.

What to Imbibe

Ever the gregarious host, Auric Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe) serves refreshments to friends and foe alike, drinking in the Kentucky setting with a Mint Julep that he describes as “traditional but satisfying.” He serves one to Pussy and even one to Bond, who requests “sour mash, but not too sweet, please.”

The mint julep is one of the most venerated cocktails in the history of American drinking, dating back to the late 18th century as a spirited concoction for southerners to beat the heat. Kentucky bourbon has arguably emerged as the preferred base spirit, though gin and rum have also been mentioned in the annals of julep history.

Today, the IBA-specified mint julep calls for four mint leaves, a teaspoon of powdered sugar, and two teaspoons of water to be muddled in a highball glass, filled with crushed ice, and then topped with two ounces of bourbon and stirred until the glass is cold, when it’s topped with a mint sprig and enjoyed. (Traditionalists may prefer a silver or pewter cup, held only by the top and bottom edges to avoid transferring too much heat to the drink.)

Honor Blackman as Pussy Galore in Goldfinger (1964)

How to Get the Look

Pussy Galore dresses comfortably but professionally for an afternoon spent on a stud farm, and the sensibilities of her equestrian-themed outfit could easily transfer to a man’s clothing.

• Tan corduroy single-breasted 3-button jacket with notch lapels, flapped hip pockets, and 3-button cuffs
• Oatmeal melange merino wool turtleneck sweater
• Beige flat front high-rise riding trousers with side pockets and zip-side bottoms
• Tan suede high-heeled Chelsea boots
• Black-and-white socks
• Rolex GMT Master ref. 6542 stainless steel watch with blue-and-red “Pepsi” bezel, black bakelite dial (with 3:00 date window), and steel “Oyster”-style three-piece link bracelet

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The post Goldfinger: Pussy Galore’s Corduroy Jacket and Turtleneck appeared first on BAMF Style.

Tom Cruise and Rebecca De Mornay in Risky Business (1983). Photo by Steve Schapiro.

Vitals

Tom Cruise as Joel Goodson, ambitious high school student-turned-pimp

Chicago, Fall 1983

Film: Risky Business
Release Date: August 5, 1983
Director: Paul Brickman
Costume Designer: Robert De Mora

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

As we enter “Back to School” season, I want to look at one of the most famous cinematic intersections of style and scholastics, a dark coming-of-age comedy starring a young Tom Cruise as a high school student whose desire to compete in the modern materialistic marketplace leads to his engaging in some perilous pursuits… or Risky Business, if you will.

In addition with providing Cruise with his breakout role, Risky Business pleasantly surprised me with a more darkly satirical tone than many contemporary sex comedies, weaving in criticism of ’80s hyper-materialism and the increased pressure on younger people to succeed. Even the name of Cruise’s character—Joel Goodson—implies the innate demand placed on our teenage hero by his well-intended, if oblivious, parents to follow their own examples: go to Princeton, make money, and raise a family in the affluent suburbs.

Joel’s more laidback pal Miles (Curtis Armstrong) notes his friend running the risk of burning out and offers some advice:

Sometimes you gotta say “What the fuck”, make your move. Joel, every now and then, saying “What the fuck” brings freedom. Freedom brings opportunity, opportunity makes your future. So your parents are going out of town. You got the place all to yourself…

With his parents abroad, Joel has the run of their North Shore house, immediately treating himself to TV dinners, his father’s Scotch (drowned in Coca-Cola), and some Bob Seger tunes. As Joel’s desire to hasten his sense of adult sophistication intensifies, he also retains the services of an escort, Lana (Rebecca De Mornay). The young duo’s financial entanglements evolve into more personal territory as Joel becomes reluctantly engaged in a struggle against Lana’s dangerous pimp, Guido (Joe “Joey Pants” Pantoliano).

Joel’s own stakes soar when he accidentally submerges his father’s prized Porsche 928 into Lake Michigan. Facing astronomical repair costs and armed with a beautiful, well-connected prostitute, Joel lands on the best option available to him: turning his parents’ home into a brothel during an all-night party to raise the funds that will get the car fixed.

What’d He Wear?

Risky Business‘ most iconic costume-related moment would arguably be Cruise sliding across the hardwood floor in red-striped OCBD, whitey-tightys, and tube socks set to Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll”, but as far as actual style, I would argue the most significant or memorable fashion moment would be Joel fulfilling his persona as the most celebrated pimp of the suburbs, dressing down his tweed sport jacket with T-shirt, jeans, and—when the moment’s right—his Ray-Ban Wayfarers.

Identifiable as Donegal tweed by the bright flecks of color irregularly woven against the dark gray woolen ground, the single-breasted jacket has notch lapels with sporty welts along the edges, rolling down to a two-button front. The jacket also boasts a welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, a long single vent and three buttons on the cuff of each sleeve.

Ray-Bans, Dairy Queen, and Marlboros: the three ingredients to success as a teenage pimp in early ’80s Chicago.

When we first see Joel’s tweed jacket, he and Miles are anxiously seated in the lobby of Chicago’s Drake Hotel, having tracked down Lana after she lifted the Goodson family’s prized Steuben glass egg in lieu of the $300 that Joel owed her for their night together. Up through this point in the story, Joel’s style has felt like a manifestation of his Princeton ambitions, and he arguably looks the part wearing his tweed jacket with the more traditionally prep rig of a blue oxford-cloth shirt, striped tie, and slacks.

Joel’s shirt is constructed in a blue and white woven oxford cotton that presents a rich light blue finish, detailed with the button-down collar that had been an Ivy favorite since the early days of the 20th century when then-Brooks Brothers president John E. Brooks introduced his “Polo” shirt, inspired by the fastened-down collars of English polo players. The shirt also has a front placket and rounded barrel cuffs, each closing with the mother-of-pearl buttons matching those on the collar.

Joel dresses in his trad finest when flagging down Lana at the Drake Hotel.

Joel’s red silk tie has closely spaced shadowed beige, dark navy, and pale blue stripes, following the American “downhill” direction of right shoulder-to-left hip.

His gray wool flat front trousers are held up by a dark leather belt, with plain-hemmed bottoms that break cleanly over his dark brown leather lace-up shoes.

Joel and Miles are each clad in gray sports coats for their “mission” to the Drake, though Joel would soon appropriate Mr. “What the Fuck”‘s more laidback approach that pairs the jacket with a dark T-shirt and jeans rather than the traditional shirt, tie, and slacks.

Promotional shot of Tom Cruise for Risky Business, photographed by Steve Schapiro.

Considerably later, Joel and Miles have aligned with Lana, who agrees to recruit her fellow filles de joie for the bacchanal to raise money for the totaled Porsche. Joel breaks from his usual Ivy-inspired wardrobe for the party, which itself deviates in unexpected directions from his impromptu interview with a Princeton recruiter to his late-night tryst with Lana on the L train.

By swapping out his usual button-down, polo shirt, or sweater for the plain black T-shirt and jeans that recalls James Dean more than Dean Acheson, Joel indicates that he’s aware of how much his image correlates to his ambitions. Tonight, he’s not the overachieving student with an Ivy League future, he’s a cool, successful entrepreneur in a dangerous field.

Of course, we see Joel’s posturing for what it is, and we grow increasingly aware of his attempts to project this new “bad boy” image that submerges his layers of desperation and insecurity. His Joel the Pimp persona—complete with those famous Ray-Bans worn at night, and inside!—acts aloof during his conversation with the Princeton recruiter… but his almost immediate regret reminds us that this swaggering, shades-wearing wannabe lothario is all just an act. The next day, Joel slowly starts rebuilding his image with a tame sweater and boat shoes, working his way back to the checked OCBD, dark Shetland, and corduroys as he resumes his preordained path toward the suburban ideal of success.

With his change of wardrobe (and Lana’s influence), Joel transforms from the “good son” too nervous to call an escort into a rebellious “bad boy” who has sex on public transportation.

Joel leaves his OCBDs, Shetland sweaters, and Princeton sweatshirts in the closet for the party, dressing the part of a ’50s-era rebel in his plain black cotton T-shirt. He wears the crew-neck, short-sleeved pocket T tucked into his jeans.

Promotional shot of Tom Cruise for Risky Business, photographed by Steve Schapiro.

He also establishes a clear departure from his clean-cut preppy image by completing his look with a set of black acetate-framed Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses which instantly recall Risky Business for many, even almost 40 years later.

Ray-Ban launched the Wayfarer in 1952, its bold trapezoidal frame becoming quickly emblematic in an era that celebrated sharp tail fins. Initially embraced by celebrities, Wayfarers gradually fell out of fashion by the ’70s. Perhaps noticing the small but positive impression made on sales after they were featured in The Blues Brothers, Ray-Ban launched a major product placement deal to feature their eyewear across the most stylish productions of the ’80s.

Risky Business was the first of Tom Cruise’s unofficial “Ray-Ban trilogy” through the ’80s, as Joel Goodson’s Wayfarers—featured in the first shot of the movie as well as significant placement on promotional art—revitalized interest in the then-retro style, resulting in a 50% increase in Wayfarer sales, according to Brands & Films.

Three years later, Cruise was again tapped as Ray-Ban’s cinematic ambassador when Pete “Maverick” Mitchell and his fellow Navy fliers fulfilled their need for speed while sporting Ray-Ban Aviators in Top Gun. After a brief foray into Persol territory in Cocktail, Cruise once again represented Ray-Ban when he wore their browline-framed Clubmaster model during his road trip with Dustin Hoffman in Rain Man. (Interestingly, Hoffman’s performance as Benjamin Braddock in The Graduate could arguably be called a spiritual predecessor of Joel Goodson.)

Described in the Heritage Auctions listing as “possibly the most famous sunglasses ever to appear on the big screen,” Cruise’s screen-worn Wayfarers from Risky Business were sold at auction in December 2019. The classic Wayfarer style can also be purchased new via Amazon or Ray-Ban.

What do you notice first, the Ray-Bans or the physics-defying degree of Tom Cruise’s chortle?

To some, tailored jackets like sports coats and blazers have no business being worn with denim, but I appreciate how Joel appropriates his tweed jacket to add a touch of class to his T-shirt and jeans. The jeans are his usual blue denim Levi’s, with a button fly that suggests the classic 501 Original Fit. (My most significant criticism would be that, with his T-shirt tucked in, the jeans worn sans belt looks incomplete.)

Miles and Joel evidently adopted gray sport jackets, crew-neck shirts, and jeans as their unofficial uniform as party hosts.

Joel wears his favorite white leather Nike Cortez sneakers, detailed with blue “swoosh” sides and flat white laces through the seven sets of eyelets. Designed by Nike co-founder and Olympian track coach Bill Bowerman, the Cortez debuted in 1972 and quickly gained notice as the favored running shoe for many American athletes competing in that year’s Summer Olympics. The Cortez quickly earned a reputation for balancing comfort, durability, and performance, contributing greatly to Nike’s early success and undergoing several redesigns in the nearly 50 years since its introduction.

A similar approach to dressing would reappear nearly 25 years later on Californication as David Duchovny’s Hank Moody—interestingly, an avowed Tom Cruise hater—sports a pair of Nike Cortez sneakers with his everyday sports coat, black T-shirt, and jeans in the first season episode “Absinthe Makes the Heart Grow Fonder”.

How to Get the Look

Tom Cruise as Joel Goodson in Risky Business (1983)

Sunglasses at night—even iconic frames like Ray-Ban Wayfarers—may be pushing it, but students returning to school and looking to up their style game could take a few pointers from Joel Goodson’s party night attire, keeping things youthful in his plain dark T-shirt, jeans, and classic sneakers but layering with a sophisticated sports coat that doesn’t threaten to age its wearer.

• Dark gray mixed Donegal tweed single-breasted 2-button sport jacket with swelled-edge notch lapels, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and long single vent
• Black cotton crew-neck short-sleeve T-shirt with pocket
  • Similar available via Amazon
• Blue denim Levi’s 501 Original Fit button-fly jeans
  • Available via Amazon and Levi’s
• White leather Nike Cortez sneakers with navy “swoosh” logos
  • Available via Amazon and Nike
• Black acetate-framed Ray-Ban Wayfarer sunglasses
  • Available via Amazon and Ray-Ban

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

As one of the biggest hits of the ’80s, it would have made aspiring businessmen Joel and Miles proud of its $63.5 million box office figures, nearly a 1,000% increase over its mere $6.5 million budget.

The Quote

All I’m saying is… walk like a man.

The post Risky Business: Tom Cruise in Donegal Tweed appeared first on BAMF Style.

William Hurt as Ned Racine in Body Heat (1981)

Vitals

William Hurt as Ned Racine, unscrupulous attorney

Palm Beach, Florida, Summer 1981

Film: Body Heat
Release Date: August 28, 1981
Director: Lawrence Kasdan
Costume Designer: Renié

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

I couldn’t let the hottest summer of my lifetime end without talking about Body Heat, especially as Lawrence Kasdan’s sweaty directorial debut will celebrate the 40th anniversary of its release in two days.

The term “neo-noir” has often been used—and, indeed, overused—to describe stylish, shadowy, and sexy crime dramas with elements recalling film noir’s golden era in the ’40s and ’50s, though Body Heat struck me as one of the prized handful of movies most deserving of the description, perfectly balancing the spirit of classic noir with contemporary cinematic expectations without falling too far in either direction.

William Hurt excels as our protagonist too weak-willed to prevent the inevitable, but it’s Kathleen Turner who truly shines in her remarkable debut as the seductive femme fatale, bringing a dangerous sensuality to the screen that hadn’t been seen since Lauren Bacall tossed Bogie his pack of matches nearly forty years earlier.

Ned Racine (Hurt) is a small-time south Florida lawyer, liked well enough for his easygoing demeanor that ostensibly makes up for his lack of scruples or talent. Already partially melted by a heat wave flattening the region, Ned quickly becomes putty in the hands of Matty Walker (Turner), a deep-voiced dame who makes no secret of her marriage to domineering land investor Edmund Walker (Richard Crenna)… nor does she make any secret of her discontentment in the union.

Without the spirit of Walter Neff around to warn him, Ned blossoms Matty’s suggestions into a full-blown murder plot, recruiting the help of Teddy Lewis (Mickey Rourke), a bombmaker who Ned once defended in court. Despite Ned being the legal counsel and Teddy being the wild incendiary specialist, the surprisingly loyal Teddy tries to warn Ned off: “Anytime you try a decent crime, you got 50 ways you can fuck up. If you think of 25 of them, then you’re a genius… and you ain’t no genius.”

As Ned and Matty swiftly work through Teddy’s checklist of 50 ways, the net begins closing in on Ned… and not just from the police.

All that’s left between the two co-conspirators and ex-lovers is sweat, deceit, and a nickel-plated revolver… recalling Double Indemnity, oft cited to be Body Heat‘s spiritual predecessor.

What’d He Wear?

Dressed as the stereotypical Southern lawyer in his seersucker, Ned Racine knows he can at least look the part that he can’t perform; hardly an Atticus Finch or a Matlock, Ned’s reputation for ineptitude indeed turns out to have been the key to his getting entangled with Matty in the first place.

After finishing his cigarette, Ned pulls on his seersucker jacket and tightens his tie before entering a fashionable Palm Beach restaurant.

A thin puckered cotton fabric made in a slack-tension weave, seersucker had long been a warm-weather favorite cloth for everything from workwear to bedding and bags. It wasn’t until the early 20th century when seersucker was applied to tailored clothing en masse, when New Orleans haberdasher Joseph Haspel introduced the seersucker suit as a lightweight alternative to businessmen and lawyers, allowing a greater ability to dress professionally yet comfortably in a muggy climate.

The traditional seersucker is the alternating blue and white railroad stripe as Ned wears, so named for its resemblance to the hard-wearing workwear favored by train engineers. Ned’s single-breasted seersucker jacket otherwise resembles most suit jackets or sports coats of the early ’80s, configured with notch lapels and two white plastic sew-through buttons that correspond to two white-threaded buttonholes on the opposing side. The sleeves are finished with three white buttons on each cuff, and the jacket—shaped with front darts—also has a long single vent, welted breast pocket, and flapped patch pockets over the hips.

The tables turn as Ned finds himself desperately seeking the counsel of his one-time client Teddy Lewis (Mickey Rourke).

Blue shirts and navy ties are an oft-favored combination with blue-and-white striped seersucker jackets, as previously featured on screen by the more naive likes of Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate and Richard Benjamin in Goodbye, Columbus as well as cannier types like Robert Duvall as Tom Hagen in The Godfather, Part II, and Darren McGavin as Kolchak: The Night Stalker.

Ned follows his vaunted predecessors by also tying on a navy cotton tie, knotted in a half-Windsor that’s almost perpetually loosened.

In response to the overwhelming heat, Ned peels off his extraneous layers at every opportunity, whether that means sitting shirtless in front of his friends as they gently accuse him of complicity in a murder plot or stripping down to no more than cutoff jorts as he seeks to seduce Maddy during an inopportune visit from his niece.

For Body Heat‘s explosive climax, Ned’s down to his shirt sleeves, evidently leaving his jacket and tie in the car as he prowls the Walker estate in an oxford cloth button-down (OCBD) made from blue and white end-on-end cotton, so finely woven to create an overall light blue finish. The OCBD’s tenure as an Ivy favorite dates back nearly to when Brooks Brothers introduced it at the beginning of the 20th century, inspired by English polo players fastening their collars in place during play. In addition to the celebrated button-down collar, Ned’s shirt has a front placket, breast pocket, button cuffs, and box-pleated back.

Ned rotates between several pairs of trousers with his seersucker jacket, first seen wearing a dark pair at his impromptu dinner with the Walkers. For the climactic scenes at the Walker home, he’s wearing a pair of lighter gray flat front slacks with side pockets, a flapped back-right pocket, and turn-ups (cuffs) on the bottom that break over the black leather lace-up shoes which coordinate with his black leather belt.

After some recon at the Walker boat house, Ned formulates a new plan in time for Matty’s return.

Ned always keeps handy his sunglasses, a pair of thin black-framed aviator sunglasses, consistent with the style of eyewear that continued to be en vogue from the previous decade.

As Ned counts down the minutes and seconds until Matty’s return, we get a close look at his gold-plated Caravelle automatic watch, secured via expanding band over his left wrist. Bulova introduced the Caravelle line in 1962, intending to balance a sophisticated New York-influenced aesthetic, Bulova’s Swiss-made quality, and a budget-friendly cost.

The plain round white dial with its italicized numeric hour markers, each with a luminous dot, remains protected under a crystal that appears to have taken plenty of abuse over the years. The micro-sized text at the bottom of the dial offers the timepiece’s West German provenance.

At nearly a quarter past 10 by Ned’s Caravelle, Matty still hasn’t returned home.

The Gun

Recalling the gun that Edmund Walker had unexpectedly drawn during the murder, Ned rifles through the deceased man’s closet to arm himself for the finale with the same nickel-plated Colt Detective Special before Matty returns.

Ned retrieves Edmund’s nickel-plated, third-generation Colt Detective Special, a wild card that had nearly foiled his and Matty’s murder plot and now—with any luck—would also subvert any lethal plans she had for her erstwhile accomplice.

The Colt Detective Special had been introduced by Colt in 1927 as a powerful, reliable, and easily concealed “belly gun” for plainclothes officers, offering six rounds of .38 Special in a “snub-nosed” revolver with a two-inch barrel. Despite competition from Smith & Wesson with models like the five-shot Model 36 Chiefs Special, the Detective Special remained generally unchanged for nearly a half-century, aside from a few changes introduced in the late ’40s.

In 1973, Colt modernized the weapon’s appearance and functionality with a variation that would be known as the “Third Series” Detective Special, most significantly differentiated by the addition of a full shroud enclosing the ejector rod under the barrel. Other changes included a fuller wooden grip that wrapped around the front of the frame strap and improved lock-work. Despite these changes, demand for an aging revolver couldn’t keep up in the age of “wonder nine” semi-automatic pistols, and Colt ended production of the Detective Special in 1986. (A brief run of “Fourth Series” Detective Specials would also be manufactured in the early ’90s.)

William Hurt as Ned Racine in Body Heat (1981)

How to Get the Look

Unable to rely on his reputation alone, Ned Racine makes sure to look the part of the genial, accomplished Southern lawyer in his seersucker jacket, accompanied by an Ivy-inspired blue OCBD and navy tie that—as he’s arguably no Cantab, Tiger, or Yalie—was likely influenced by his desire to fit in during the prep renaissance of the early ’80s.

• Blue-and-white railroad stripe puckered cotton seersucker single-breasted 2-button jacket with welted breast pocket, flapped patch hip pockets, 3-button cuffs, and single vent
• Light blue oxford cloth cotton shirt with button-down collar, front placket, breast pocket, button cuffs, and box-pleated back
• Navy cotton tie
• Light gray flat front trousers with belt loops, side pockets, flapped back-right pocket, and turn-ups/cuffs
• Black leather belt with polished steel squared single-prong buckle
• Black leather lace-up dress shoes
• Black thin-framed aviator sunglasses
• Gold-plated Caravelle automatic wristwatch with round white dial on gold expanding bracelet

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie, or stream it on Criterion Channel before it leaves at the end of this month!

The Quote

Keep talking, Matty. Experience shows I can be convinced of anything.

The post Body Heat: William Hurt’s Lawyerly Seersucker appeared first on BAMF Style.

Timothy Olyphant as Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens on Justified (Episode 1.09: “Hatless”)

Vitals

Timothy Olyphant as Raylan Givens, old-fashioned Deputy U.S. Marshal

Harlan County, Kentucky, Spring 2010

Series: Justified
Episode: “Hatless” (Episode 1.09)
Air Date: May 11, 2010
Director: Peter Werner
Creator: Graham Yost
Costume Designer: Ane Crabtree

Background

Today marks the return of college football season, so I wanted to look at how a BAMF Style favorite incorporated some team pride into an off-duty look. The ninth episode of Justified begins with Raylan Givens drinking away his suspension from the U.S. Marshals Service, or as he calls it, “a well-earned vacation.”

Unfortunately for an increasingly drunk Raylan, he’s joined at the bar by two obnoxious rednecks yukking it up about one of their recent romantic misadventures…

Raylan: Gentlemen, I’m sorry to interrupt… could you just keep it down a bit?
Drunk Man: Why would we do that?
Raylan: Because I didn’t order assholes with my whiskey…

Correctly diagnosed with “harborin’ a bit of hostility there”, Raylan follows the two men outside to work out their issues with their fists… but the two men get the better of the whiskey-soaked marshal, who ends the pre-credits sequence bruised, bloodied, and—worse yet—rid of his signature hat, resulting in the episode’s title.

What’d He Wear?

Before spending most of the episode without it, Raylan wears his famous wide-brimmed hat, crafted properly to accommodate one of Elmore Leonard’s conditions before allowing the series itself to be made. Timothy Olyphant once again featured the wares of L.A.-based milliner Baron Hats, who had supplied his headgear on Deadwood, to create Raylan’s sahara tan cattleman-style hat, detailed with a narrow brown tooled leather band with its curved single-prong buckle on the left side.

More than a decade after the series premiered, Baron Hats continues to market “The RG”, with its 4.25″-tall cattleman’s crown, 3.25″-wide brim, and available in the same 200XXX beaver felt as worn on the show.

In one of his last moments with his hat, Raylan sizes up his opponents.

Off duty due to his suspension, Raylan foregoes his suit jackets and skinny ties, instead wearing a plaid shirt open over his Florida Gators T-shirt. The excellent Facebook page “It was Justified” has identified the plaid shirt as made by Mossimo Supply Co. and the T-shirt as an Adidas product.

The brushed cotton flannel long-sleeved shirt is patterned in a red and black plaid with a pale-gray overcheck, with a spread collar, button cuffs, and two chest pockets, each with a flap that closes through a smoke-gray plastic sew-through button matching those up the front placket.

Does Raylan’s Gators shirt imply that the college he attended on his Aunt Helen’s savings was the University of Florida? Or did he just become a fan during his years in Florida with USMS? Either way, he celebrates the Gainesville-based college when he peels off the plaid shirt to reveal a heathered gray cotton short-sleeved T-shirt emblazoned with a faded, vintage-inspired logo of a green alligator sporting an orange T-shirt with a blue “F” on it, flanked above and below with the words “FLORIDA” and “GATORS”.

Preparing to kick ass, Raylan peels off his over-shirt and hangs up his hat, turning to battle in a Florida Gators T-shirt that makes its sole appearance in “Hatless” after the opening scene renders it too bloody and stretched-out to reappear.

After an early advantage in the fight, our drunken hero ends up spending more time than we’d like to see crawling on the dirty pavement behind the bar, scuffing his dark blue Levi’s jeans, identifiable by the signature red tab sewn along in the inside of the back-right patch pocket. These jeans are likely the 501 Original Fit button-fly jeans, held up with his usual brown tooled leather belt. As he’s both suspended and drinking, Raylan wisely leaves his Glock and holster at home.

Raylan began the series wearing brown anteater cowboy boots by Justin, though these would be swapped out for ostrich-leg Lucchese boots beginning in the third season, following the new direction of costume designer Patia Prouty, who replaced Ane Crabtree for the second season onward. After Winona (Natalie Zea) takes an injured Raylan back to his motel room, she pulls off his boots to show that he’s wearing a pair of dark brown boot socks.

Raylan’s strategy of temporarily disabling one of his opponents with a boot-kick to the groin gives him the upper hand for a few seconds. Unfortunately for Raylan, it’s still two against one… and a relatively drunk one at that.

After prominently wearing a Rolex Submariner for much of the pilot episode, Raylan straps on a brushed steel TAG Heuer Series 6000 Chronometer as his watch of choice for the duration of Justified, the leather bracelet alternating between a black strap or—as seen here—a textured brown strap. Consistent with dive watches, Raylan’s timepiece has a rotating bezel that surrounds the round white dial with its 3:00 date window.

While Raylan’s opponents may have left with his hat, they didn’t bother taking the marshal’s trusty TAG Heuer.

For an additional cowboy-influenced touch, Raylan regularly wears a sterling silver statement ring with a horseshoe and braided sides that taper toward the back of the band.

What to Imbibe

“I’m assuming you’re not gonna stop,” the bartender suggests as he brings forth the bottle to pour Raylan yet another shot of bourbon. “Can’t see one good reason why I should,” Raylan responds, quickly downing the shot of what appears to be a fictional “Old Kentucky” label that’s poured before him.

Several drinks—and kicks and punches—later, a battered Raylan is returned to his motel room, where he keeps a fifth of Jim Beam within reach on the bedside table.

A bottle of Jim Beam stands on Raylan’s nightstand as Winona pulls off his boots.

Justified did much to bring exposure to fine bourbons like Blanton’s, Buffalo Trace, Elmer T. Lee, and Pappy Van Winkle, though there must be very few even in the non-bourbon drinking world who are unfamiliar with Jim Beam, whose standard 80-proof “White Label” variety was deemed the world’s most popular bourbon in Brad Japhe’s reporting for Forbes last year, citing the IWSR Drinks Market Analysis.

Beam family bourbon traces its origins back to 1795. Production was interrupted by Prohibition, after which the distillery was rebuilt by then-manager James B. Beam, for whom the modern iteration of the company is named. The brand followed suit in 1943 when its signature product was renamed “Jim Beam” rather than “Old Tub”, under which it had been marketed since 1880.

The recent bourbon renaissance encouraged Jim Beam to expand its lineup, which now includes nearly a dozen whiskies (including a rye), flavored whiskey liqueurs, and even pre-mixed cocktails.

How to Get the Look

Timothy Olyphant as Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens on Justified (Episode 1.09: “Hatless”)

Even when not on duty, Raylan Givens wears his everyday cowboy hat, boots, belt, and jeans, though he layers more informally in a plaid shirt unbuttoned over a T-shirt celebrating his favorite team, in this case the Florida Gators. Of course, not all teams coordinate with a cowboy hat so you may want to consider being “Hatless” from the get-go.

• Red, black, and pale-gray plaid cotton flannel long-sleeve shirt with spread collar, two button-down flapped chest pockets, and button cuffs
• Gray heathered “Florida Gators” short-sleeve T-shirt
• Dark blue denim Levi’s 501 Original Fit button-fly jeans
• Brown tooled leather belt with silver-toned single-prong buckle
• Brown anteater Justin cowboy boots
• Dark brown boot socks
• Baron Hats “The RG” sahara tan 200XXX beaver felt cattleman’s hat with a thin tooled leather band
• TAG Heuer Series 6000 Chronometer wristwatch with brushed steel case, white dial, and black leather strap
• Sterling silver horseshoe ring with braided side detail
• White ribbed cotton sleeveless undershirt

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the series. I also recommend that fans of the show who are on Facebook follow the great page @EverythingJustified which features many great photos, videos, and moments from the series as well as shots of screen-worn gear.

The post Justified: Raylan’s Florida Gators T-shirt appeared first on BAMF Style.

Daniel Kaluuya as Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah (2021)

Vitals

Daniel Kaluuya as Fred Hampton, chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party

Chicago, Fall 1968

Film: Judas and the Black Messiah
Release Date: February 12, 2021
Director: Shaka King
Costume Designer: Charlese Antoinette Jones

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

This year, Daniel Kaluuya won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his charismatic portrayal of Fred Hampton, the chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, born 73 years ago today on August 30, 1948. Kaluuya’s Oscar marked one of many accolades for Judas and the Black Messiah, which was also nominated for Best Picture and won Kaluuya himself at least 15 additional acting awards.

Judas and the Black Messiah follows Hampton over the last year of his life, from the time that the titular “Judas”, federal informant Bill O’Neal (LaKeith Stanfield), infiltrated the Illinois chapter of the Black Panthers. We meet Hampton in the midst of his ongoing campaign to fundraise and recruit for the Black Panthers, driving interest in his program to feed Chicago’s hungry children, and building his “Rainbow Coalition” that would unite diverse groups like the Young Lords and the Young Patriots in the fight for social change.

Fred Hampton (1948-1969), wearing the belted corduroy coat that likely inspired the oft-seen jacket worn by Daniel Kaluuya.

What’d He Wear?

Nominated for Excellence in Period Film by the Costume Designers Guild, Charlese Antoinette Jones had been researching material for more than a year before production of Judas and the Black Messiah was even greenlit, according to Crystal Ro for Buzzfeed. In addition to the photographs, footage, and documentaries chronicling Fred Hampton’s public work at the end of the end of the 1960s, Jones also consulted many contemporary catalogs and magazines like Ebony and GQ to source how those in his orbit—from fellow Panthers to FBI agents—would have dressed.

The depth of Jones’ extensive research translates from reality to screen, depicting not only the Black Panthers’ famous berets and field jackets but also the real Hampton’s no-frills, utilitarian sense of dress, anchored by plain pullover shirts and rugged, practical coats that provided an insular layer during his work in the Windy City.

Kaluuya’s Hampton is introduced during a demonstration at Wilbur Wright College, where his electrifying revolutionary speech attracts the attention of student Deborah Johnson (Dominique Fishback). He’s dressed for the rally in a camo bucket hat, heavy corduroy coat, and simple sweatshirt, all of which reflect items worn by the real Hampton.

The actual type of hat worn by Hampton is specifically called a “Jones hat”, in reference to the Jones Hat Company in St. Joseph, Missouri that had pioneered this style of hunting headgear in the 1880s. Though it may look like a traditional bucket hat with its soft, bell-shaped crown and downward sloping brim, the front of the brim is actually stiffer than the rest, which can all be turned up for a baseball cap-like effect that leaves only the front of the brim folded down. The crown is comprise of six triangular panels that converge under a button at the top.

Consistent with the Panthers’ incorporation of military styles, Hampton’s heavy cotton canvas hat is patterned in the traditional ERDL camouflage that had been developed for the U.S. Army decades earlier but not widely issued until the Vietnam War, specifically the “highland” pattern in tan, brown, green, and black which would evolve into the currently issued “U.S. Woodland” pattern in the early 1980s.

Note the seam creating a semi-circle across the front of Hampton’s hat-brim, indicating the portion that can remain down when the rest of the brim folds up.

Hampton’s single-breasted, thigh-length car coat is made from a copper brown medium-waled corduroy with three dark brown woven leather buttons widely spaced up the front. The top part of the revere collar is faced in a smooth suede-like fustian, detailed only with four seams running the around the collar.

While the color was likely informed by the real Hampton’s frequently worn corded coat, it’s also consistent with Jones’ costume design vision, as she explained to Amy Lee for ET Online that “the Panthers’ color palette is more of a warm, earth tones palette.” Jones elaborated to Fawnia Soo Hoo for Fashionista that the vintage screen-worn jacket is “just a little bit more dynamic than the one the actual Chairman Fred wore — the lapels are bigger, the colors a little bit more vibrant.”

The shoulders are offset by heavily swelled yokes, and the pocket configuration mimics some pea jackets with a pair of slanted-entry hand pockets positioned just above the flapped hip pockets.

Fred Hampton’s corduroy coat serves as more of a personal jacket than the olive drab field jackets which would be established as the Illinois chapter’s de facto uniform and which Fred himself is depicted wearing on limited occasions.

Consistent with historical documentation, Hampton’s on-screen wardrobe is driven by function and utility, a particular contrast with the flashier-dressing Bill O’Neal.

To that end, Hampton frequently dresses in plain crew-neck T-shirts and sweatshirts, such as the heathered gray cotton raglan-sleeve sweatshirt worn under his corduroy coat for the Wilbur Wright College demonstration and sans coat in a following scene as he shares his philosophy with the latest Panther recruits.

In these earlier scenes, Hampton frequently wears a pair of rich dark blue denim jeans with the bottoms self-cuffed to break over the top of his black leather combat boots. The contrasting arcuate stitching across the back pockets suggests Levi’s.

As the coalition grows stronger, Hampton makes more public appearances wearing the signature black beret that the Black Panthers adopted following co-founder Huey P. Newton describing the soft, round-crowned headgear as a revolutionary symbol across the world.

Jones intentionally followed historical record by not placing Hampton in a black beret for many scenes; alternately, we see Bill O’Neal wearing his beret almost constantly, part of his overcompensation to look the part of the role he’s playing on behalf of the feds. In addition to the Panthers in their black berets, the rest of the Rainbow Coalition adopt their own colored berets, with the Crowns in green, the Young Patriots in brown, and the Young Lords in purple. According to Nikara Jones of Footwear News, Jones sourced the berets from military outfitter Rothco.

Though public appearances like this Rainbow Coalition protest call for Hampton to join his fellow Panthers in their black berets, he still stands unique in his brown corduroy coat rather than a field jacket. Note that Young Lords leader Jose “Cha Cha” Jiminez (Nicholas Velez) also sports his organization’s purple beret. To Hampton’s right, Young Patriots leader William “Preacherman” Fesperman (Nick Fink) wears a black cowboy hat rather than the brown berets seemingly adopted by the YPO.

For these scenes, Hampton has swapped his sweatshirt for a loose-fitting white T-shirt with a narrow crew neck, tucked into a pair of olive drab flat front trousers that present a militant appearance similar to the then-issued OG-107 fatigue pants (though these trousers have more conventional side pockets rather than the patch-style pockets on G.I. OG-107s.)

You can read more about the costumes of Judas and the Black Messiah from these interviews with Jones:

• “23 Interesting Things To Know About The Costumes In ‘Judas And The Black Messiah'” by Crystal Ro for Buzzfeed
• “‘Judas and the Black Messiah’ Costume Designer on Recreating Iconic Black Panther Party Outfits” by Amy Lee for Entertainment Tonight
• “The Costumes in ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’ Offer a History Lesson in Social Justice” by Fawnia Soo Hoo for Fashionista
• “How ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’ Costume Designer Recreated Iconic Black Panther Party Uniforms” by Nikara Jones for Footwear News
• “The Costumes Of Judas & The Black Messiah” by Charles McFarlane for Put This On
• “A Look at the Costume Design of ‘Judas and the Black Messiah'” by Jazz Tangcay for Variety
• “The Politics of Fashion in Judas and the Black Messiah” by Jasmine Fox-Suliaman for Who What Wear

How to Get the Look

Daniel Kaluuya as Fred Hampton in Judas and the Black Messiah (2021)

In addition to the Black Panthers’ trademark black berets and field jackets, Judas and the Black Messiah presents equally functional alternatives inspired by the actual Fred Hampton’s approach to dressing, such as this versatile corded coat.

• Copper brown corduroy car coat with revere collar, three woven leather buttons, hand pockets, and flapped hip pockets
• Heathered light gray cotton crew-neck raglan-sleeve sweatshirt
• Dark blue Levi’s jeans or olive drab flat front trousers
• Black leather lace-up combat boots
• Camouflage canvas Jones-style hunting hat

Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

The Quote

America is on fire right now, and until that fire is extinguished, don’t nothin’ else mean a goddamn thing.

The post Judas and the Black Messiah: Fred Hampton’s Corduroy Coat appeared first on BAMF Style.